Miss Farrar smiled vindictively. Her eyes shone.
"You need not wait long," she said.
There was a crash of a falling stone wall, and of parting bushes, but not in time to give Lathrop warning. As though from the branches of the trees opposite two soldiers fell into the road; around his hat each wore the red band of the invader; each pointed his rifle at Lathrop.
"Hands up!" shouted one. "You're my prisoner!" cried the other.
Mechanically Lathrop raised his hands, but his eyes turned to Miss Farrar.
"Did you know?" he asked.
"I have been watching them," she said, "creeping up on you for the last ten minutes."
Lathrop turned to the two soldiers, and made an effort to smile.
"That was very clever," he said, "but I have twenty men up the road, and behind them a regiment. You had better get away while you can."
The two Reds laughed derisively. One, who wore the stripes of a sergeant, answered: "That won't do! We been a mile up the road, and you and us are the only soldiers on it. Gimme the gun!"