The midshipman kept his eyes anxiously on the dim light that could be faintly seen through the tent. If the general missed the paper, he might guess that it had been taken by the fugitives, and might order an instant search of the camp. He gave a sigh of relief, when he saw the light disappear the moment the French officer had entered the tent, and then crawled away through the camp.
[Chapter 20]: The Path Down The Heights.
As the midshipman crawled away from the tent of the French general, he adopted the precautions which James had suggested, and felt the ground carefully for twigs or sticks each time he moved. The still-glowing embers of the campfires warned him where the Indians and Canadians were sleeping, and, carefully avoiding these, he made his way up beyond the limits of the camp. There were no sentries posted here, for the French were perfectly safe from attack from that quarter, and, once fairly beyond the camp, the midshipman rose to his feet, and made his way to the edge of the slopes above the Saint Lawrence. He walked for about a mile, and then paused, on the very edge of the sharp declivity, and whistled as agreed upon.
A hundred yards further, he repeated the signal. The fourth time he whistled he heard, just below him, the answer, and a minute later James Walsham stood beside him.
"You young scamp, what are you doing here?"
"It was not my fault, Captain Walsham, it wasn't indeed; but I should have been tomahawked if I had stayed there a moment longer."
"What do you mean by 'you would have been tomahawked,'" James asked angrily, for he was convinced that the midshipman had made up his mind, all along, to accompany him.
"The pilot of the Sutherland swam ashore, with the news that you had been taken prisoner on purpose, and were really a spy."
"But how on earth did he know that?" James asked. "I took care the man was not on deck, when we made the holes in the boat, and he does not understand a word of English, so he could not have overheard what the men said."
"I am sorry to say, sir, that it is a case of treachery, and that one of our officers is concerned in it. The man said that an officer released him from his cell, and took him to his cabin, and then lowered him by a rope through the porthole."