"Coacoochee! So that was Nita's secret!" cried Anstice. "I might have known that nothing else would make her look so radiant. Oh! I am so glad!"
"What do you mean?" demanded the astonished lieutenant. "How could she have heard anything about the battle, when I have just come from the field with despatches for St. Augustine, and have ridden almost without stopping?"
"I don't know, for she wouldn't tell me; but I am certain she did hear some time this afternoon. But oh! Mr. Douglass, we are so thankful that you escaped so splendidly. It must have been awful. Of course you gained the victory, though?"
"I don't quite know about that," replied the lieutenant, doubtfully. "We silenced their fire, and drove them from the field after a three-hours fight; but it is said that they had less than half our number of men, and we are in full retreat. Officially, of course, we have won a victory; but it wouldn't take more than two or three such victories to use up the whole Florida army."
They discussed the exciting event for an hour longer, and then Douglass was reluctantly forced to continue his journey. When he left, he promised to be back in three days' time, as his orders were to proceed from St. Augustine to Tampa.
This promise was fulfilled; but when the lieutenant again drew rein before the hospitable plantation house, that seemed so much like a home to him, he found its inmates filled with anxiety and alarm. Nita Pacheco had disappeared under very mysterious circumstances the evening before, and no trace of her whereabouts or fate could be discovered.
FOLLOWING A MYSTERIOUS TRAIL
Nita had not appeared during the lieutenant's former brief visit to the plantation, and when, on his departure, Anstice sought her to charge her with having already learned that Coacoochee still lived, the happy girl made no denial of her knowledge. At the same time she would not reveal the source of her information, though when Anstice declared her belief that Nita had seen the young chief himself, the latter denied that such was the case. "He is wounded," she added, "and could not come. Besides," she continued proudly, "he is now head chief of the Seminole nation, and has much to think of. But he remembered me, and sent me a message."