The artillery wheeled into place and began hurling their shot into the college. It took but a few moments of this to bring the cry for quarter from within. The doors were flung open, and the Americans rushed into the building, where the British had thrown down their arms.
But some of them, apparently, had not agreed to giving up so readily; and as the victors rushed in at one end, they dashed for the windows at the other, leaped through and went racing away. A party was dispatched in pursuit, but later returned with only a handful; the others had escaped in the woods.
Washington pursued the routed regiments as far as Kingston; here, with his officers, he held a council of war. It was decided that the men were too worn out to push on to Brunswick with any speed, and that Cornwallis would be upon them before they could reach there. The word was therefore given, and the army, destroying bridges behind them, marched away toward the wooded and frowning heights about Morristown.
And as they went, Ben Cooper rode at the side of Nat Brewster, his face thoughtful and his manner strangely still. At length Nat noticed it.
“What has happened?” he asked, anxiously.
“Nothing,” replied Ben. “That is,” he added, “nothing as yet. But I fear that something—a something that neither you nor I can put hands upon—will happen, and perhaps at no distant time.”
Nat looked at him in surprise.
“I don’t understand,” said he.
“Nor I, if it comes to that,” returned Ben. Then after a short pause, he inquired: “Do you recall my saying, last night, that I fancied I heard, in conversation with General Mifflin, the voice of a stranger whom I had encountered in Philadelphia?”
“Yes.”