"Stop! or we'll shoot you!"
Quite convinced that discretion was the better part of valor, the driver promptly reined up his horses, whereupon the men, dismounting from theirs, said roughly to the alarmed passengers, most of whom had been awakened from a doze:
"Come now, hand over your purses, and be quick about it!"
None of them had been more soundly asleep than Major Rogers, and on first awaking he did not at once grasp the situation, so that Seth whispered in his ear:
"It's robbers, sir; they want our money."
At this the veteran scout understood, and instantly set his quick wits to work to meet the emergency.
"Don't speak or move until I tell you," he whispered to Seth, "but get your pistol ready."
The Major then lay back in his seat again, as though paralyzed with terror.
Meanwhile the other passengers were fumbling in their pockets and getting out their purses, one of the highwaymen holding a lantern up in his left hand so as to make sure that all were obeying orders.
Warmly wrapped as everybody was, with their purses and watches in their innermost pockets, the process of getting at them could not be a very quick one, and the highwaymen swore fiercely at them because they were not so expeditious as they thought they might be.