The report of the pistol had indeed reached the Traveller's Rest, and drawn forth its two or three inmates; who could now easily behold the whole train of horsemen dashing furiously up the ravine; and the quick eye of captain Caliver was not slow in detecting a person on horseback, with a red hat, pricking hastily away from the cottage.
"The game is sprung,—the rabbit is up!" he cried, while the fire that burned on his thin nose, seemed to have raised a kindred flash in his dark gray eyes. "Gentleman-volunteer, do you see? Now you shall behold the doings of Sky-scraper, the best horse for a long race on short fodder, that was ever galled by saddle. Up the bank here, and after!"
"You are wrong, captain, you are wrong," cried the painter, eagerly. "'Tis a white horse, you know; and this is a roan, or sorrel."
There could be no truth more incontestible than this; yet captain Caliver was of too sagacious a spirit, or perhaps was warming with too much fire, to be led from his purpose by an argument not of his own devising.
"I will be uncivil to no man but a private," he cried, fixing his eye upon the fugitive, (who was for a moment's space plainly visible, as he galloped up the road,) compressing his lips, till they actually seemed to have vanished, and, at the same time, driving his spurs deep into his steed; "I say, I will be rough-spoken to none but privates, for it does not hurt their feelings; but, by the eternal Jupiter, there goes our man!—or what does he mean by wearing a red hat? and, lastly, what does he mean by beating a retreat in such a fashion? Harkee, Mr. Gentleman-volunteer, I am glad now you fired that pistol. Had we come upon the dog silently, why then I should have picked him up, rolled up in a ball, like an opossum; which is a job for a black man, and not a captain of cavalry. I say," he continued, with increasing animation, "I am glad you have roused him, and shown him a fair field; for, by the eternal Jupiter, I have not seen a race worthy to speak of for two weeks; and, by the eternal Jupiter, you shall see such a one now as will make your blood run; and, by the eternal Jupiter, I hope his horse is blooded, for, by the eternal Jupiter, I will run him, or any other respectable tory gentleman, from time temporal to time eternal, from post to pillar, from Sunday to Saturday, and from life and the dinner-table to death and"——. And here the captain of horse, who was something of a horse himself when his blood was up, ended climacterically with a most soldier-like word, which, although it may be found in any English dictionary with which the public is acquainted, will nevertheless read more agreeably in a dictionary than any where else. He added, indeed, three more words; for turning his horse's head towards the steep bank that bounded the ravine on the right hand, he twisted a lock of the charger's mane round his finger, and uttered the cabalistic ejaculation,—
"Go it, Sky-scraper!"
The words had an immediate effect; no sooner did they reach his ear than Sky-scraper, with a plunge that carried him half a length ahead of the painter, darted to the brow of the acclivity; and Herman following, he beheld the Indian trader, (for it was this identical individual they were now pursuing,) some five or six hundred paces in advance, travelling at a very unusual pace up the highway. As Hunter reached the road, he cast his eye backwards to the hovel, and beheld, riding into the oak yard, a man whom he knew at once to be the person that had first attracted Miss Falconer's notice. He rode a white horse, and there was a red covering to his head; but this latter phenomenon, as it appeared, was owing entirely to the presence of a red handkerchief drawn over the horseman's hat, doubtless to shield his eyes from the sun-beams, or from the dazzling rays reverberated from a dusty road. There was nothing at all warlike in the appearance of this individual; on the contrary, he seemed, from his dress, to belong to the community of Friends; and he paused at the entrance of the yard, looking back on the chase he had left behind, with much innocent curiosity and wonder.
"Captain," cried the painter, at the top of his voice, "wheel about. You are leaving the true man: here he is, full in view, behind us!"
The captain answered only by repeating the charm that had already nerved the limbs, and fired the spirit of his steed; and Herman, urged by feelings and inducements of his own, followed after him; and in a few moments, the fugitive and his two pursuers were alike buried in a cloud of dust, raised by the fleet chargers.
When the two leaders so suddenly left the ravine, they were beyond the sight of those who brought up the rear; and these, not doubting they had continued their original route, galloped on themselves until they reached the little inn; where the first person they saw was a tall, middle-aged, gawky quaker, the same that had been seen by Herman, sitting astride his horse, and staring on them with gaping astonishment.