"Away, John Ramsay—away," added Horse Shoe; "and have your eyes about you, man."
With this command John Ramsay and the miller's daughter hastily withdrew, and were soon out of the sergeant's hearing.
After an interval, which doubtless seemed short to the gallant dragoon, he returned to his comrade, and the two set out rapidly in quest of their horses; and once more having got into their saddles, they retraced their steps at a brisk speed to Ramsay's cabin.
CHAPTER XXX.
All distant and faint were the sounds of the battle;
With the breezes they rise, with the breezes they fail,
Till the shout and the groan and the conflict's dread rattle,
And the chase's wild clamor come loading the gale.
The Maid of Toro.
In the confusion that ensued upon the defeat of Innis, James Curry succeeded in conducting Butler from the field. His orders were to retreat with the prisoner to Blackstock's; and he had accordingly set out with about a dozen troopers, by a private path that led towards a quarter secure from the molestation of the enemy, when the attack commenced. Butler was mounted behind one of the men, and in this uneasy condition was borne along the circuitous by-way that had been chosen, without a moment's respite from the severe motion of the horse, nearly at high speed, until, having accomplished three miles of the retreat, the party arrived at the main road that extended between Innis's camp and Blackstock's. Here Curry, conceiving himself to be out of danger of pursuit, halted his men, with a purpose to remain until he could learn something of the combat. Butler was in a state of the most exciting bewilderment as to the cause of this sudden change in his affairs. No explanation was given to him by his conductors; and although, from the first, he was aware that an extraordinary emergency had arisen from some assault upon Innis's position, no one dropped a word in his hearing to give him the slightest clue to the nature of the attack. The troopers about him preserved a morose and ill-natured silence, and even manifested towards him a harsh and resentful demeanor. He heard the firing, but what troops were engaged, by whom led, or with what chances of success, were subjects of the most painfully interesting doubt. He could only conjecture that this was a surprise accomplished by the Whigs, and that the assailants must have come in sufficient force to justify the boldness of the enterprise. That Horse Shoe was connected with this irruption he felt fully assured; and from this circumstance he gathered the consolatory and cheerful prognostic of a better issue out of his afflictions than, in his late condition, seemed even remotely possible. This hope grew brighter as the din of battle brought the tidings of the day to his ear. The first few scattered shots that told of the confusion in which the combat was begun, were, after an interval, succeeded by regular volleys of musketry that indicated an orderly and marshalled resistance. Platoon after platoon fired in succession—signifying, to the practised hearing of the soldier, that infantry was receiving the attacks of cavalry, and that as yet the first had not faltered. Then the firing grew more slack, and random shots were discharged from various quarters—but amidst these were heard no embodied volleys. It was the casual and nearly overpowered resistance of flying men.
At this juncture there was a dark frown on the brow of Curry, as he looked at his comrades, and said, in a low and muttered tone, "That helter-skelter shot grates cursedly on the ear. There's ill-luck in the sound of it."