"Friends."
"The word, friends?"
"Idiot."
"The countersign, Idiot?"
"Boy."
"Pass, Idiot Boy, and all's well!"
The schoolmaster could have boxed that sentry's ears, have slapped his face, have caned him within an inch of his life; for there was a light in an upper window, and he knew that bright eyes were looking down through the slats of the closed green shutters, and that sharp ears had caught the sound of the obnoxious words. He could detect the accents of a voice, which he knew so well, pleading the cause of silence with another that trembled with suppressed laughter as it made ineffectual promises to be quiet. The two clergymen also heard the friendly altercation at the window, so still was everything else, and chuckled as they filed past the legal sentry, now on the broad grin. The Captain and Mr. Terry were above taking notice of such trifles, for they were eagerly persuading each other to take just the least drop before going out into the heavy night dews. No sooner had the five entered the guard-room than the Squire re-formed them and marched them off to relieve the old sentries. The lawyer's place was taken by the dominie, Toner's by the Captain, that of Sylvanus by Perrowne, that of Timotheus by Errol, and Rufus' post of honour by the veteran, who would accept no other. There was a sixth guard in the person of Muggins, who kept his master company and behaved with the greatest propriety and silence. Sylvanus and Timotheus, Rufus and Ben had a separate guard-house of their own in the kitchen, where Mrs. Carmichael, who could not sleep because of her apprehensions of evil to some unknown defender, furnished them with bread and cheese and innocuous hot elderberry wine and cold cider. After partaking plentifully of the refreshments, Sylvanus and Ben lit their pipes, and the latter communicated to the company the story of his woes in the case of Serlizer. Sylvanus related his adventure in capturing Tryphosa, which caused Timotheus to move into a corner with Rufus and declare solemnly and in a low tone, that "Ef Sylvanus warn't my brother and older'n me, and the next thing t' engaged to Trypheeny, I'd be shaved an' shampooed ef I wouldn't bust his old cocoanut open." Rufus, however, replied that girls had no business to be about in war times, unless it was to nurse the sick and wounded, which was only done in hospitals, thus justifying Sylvanus' action as a pure matter of military duty, and reconciling Timotheus to the slight put upon his lady love.
The Squire and Coristine were alone in the guard-room, save when Mrs. Carmichael put her head in to ask after the welfare of the party, especially of the older members.
"Grandfather knows campaigning and can take care of himself," the Squire answered; "and the Captain's used to out-door life; but there's the minister now, puir man! Weel, weel, Marjorie, when I gang the roonds, I'll see if he needs onything."
Then the pair chatted away, chiefly about the Grinstun man, whom Carruthers came to regard in the light of a spy. Though surrounded on every side by suspicious circumstances, there was nothing definite against him, the nearest evidence to a conviction being the geological or mineralogical expressions which the unguarded dilapidated farmer on the way to the Beaver River had coupled with his name, and his own admissions to the spurious Miss Du Plessis.