“Well, and how did you carry it off with the major?” he asked when he had rubbed the sleep out of his eyes.
“Not so handsomely as I should have, had you told me it was Major Simcoe I should have to hoodwink,” I retorted. “But you are safe for the time being—which means until Major Simcoe and Arnold meet each other and fall to comparing notes.”
“And then?” queried my sergeant.
“Then Simcoe will learn that I have lied to him, and Arnold may not be able to remember that he sent you on an errand that prevented your return to the ship with his letter to the major,” I rejoined shortly.
“Which means that we have purchased—how many hours, Captain Dick?”
“God knows; and I do not. But we must make the most of what time we have. No one seems to know where our convoy ships of war have gone, or when they are to return. But with the fleet waiting in the lower bay, the interval can not be long. What we do, we must do quickly.”
“Aye,” said Champe; “and what will that be?”
I had been culling the plots out patiently ever since Castner’s announcement of the delay had set them weaving, and now there was but one that offered any promise of success—and that a desperate one. With the uncertain time-factor we had to count on, it was useless to think of trying to get word to Major Lee in the camp at Tappan. What we did must be done without help from the outside; and upon this hard-and-fast pivot the temerarious enterprise must be made to turn.
“What we thought we might accomplish with a corporal’s guard of Major Lee’s men to help us, we must still do, and do it with our hands, John Champe,” I said.
“Take him forcibly in his house, you mean?”