Breathless, Marjorie rushed into the hallway, leaving the door ajar behind her. It was late in the afternoon of a September day. The air was soft and hazy, tempered with just the chill of evening that comes at this time of the year before sundown.
More than two months had passed, months crowded with happiness which had filled her life with fancy. Her engagement to Captain Meagher had been announced, quietly and simply; their marriage was to take place in the fall. Day after day sped by and hid themselves in the records of time until the event, anxiously awaited, yet equally dreaded, was but a bare month distant. It would be a quiet affair after all, with no ostentation or display; but that would in no wise prevent her from looking her prettiest.
And so on this September afternoon while she was visiting the shops for the purpose of discovering whatever tempting and choice bits of ware they might have to offer, she thought she heard the blast of a trumpet from the direction of the balcony of the old Governor's Mansion. Attracted by the sound, which recalled to her mind a former occasion when the news of the battle of Monmouth was brought to the city by courier and announced to the public, she quickened her steps in the direction of the venerable building. True, a man was addressing the people who had congregated beneath the balcony. Straining every faculty she caught the awful news.
Straightway she sped homewards, running as often as her panting breath would allow. She did not wait to open the door, but seemed to burst through it.
"What was that, child?" her father asked quickly as he met her in the dining-room.
"Arnold ... Arnold ..." she repeated, waiting to catch her breath.
"Has betrayed, you say?"
"West Point."
"My God! We are lost."
He threw his hands heavenwards and started across the floor.