"Do you not know some one of us?" asked Belfort of Alloway. His face showed the eagerness with which he put the question.
"Yes," replied Alloway.
Perhaps I had no right to expect anything else, but the answer came like a thunderbolt, and my heart fell. Alloway would betray us, and after all there was no reason why he should not.
Belfort's eyes flashed with triumph, and his hopes overran his caution.
"Who is it? who is it?" he cried. "Is it not he?" and he pointed his finger straight at me.
Alloway examined me critically, and then said, "No, I never saw him before in my life. There's the man I meant!" He pointed at Moore and continued: "He was a prisoner with us for a while after White Plains, and I was one of the escort that took him to the British lines when we exchanged him and others."
"It's true! It's true!" said Moore. "I remember you very well since you have spoken of it; and polite you were to me, for which I thank you. Right sorry am I to see you here."
It was another release from the hangman's rope, and Belfort was defeated for the second time. He recognized the fact and fell back, looking at me in a puzzled and mortified way. I believe he was convinced then that his suspicions were wrong. Why Alloway denied me I could not guess, for surely the look from me in the street was not sufficient to disclose such a complicated situation as ours. But it had happened so, and it was not for Marcel or me to complain.
"Have you finished, Lieutenant Belfort?" asked the commandant. "I understood that something important was to follow these questions or I would not have consented to such an irregularity."