Their passage lasted some twenty minutes; a fine flight, truly, yet in Tryon County, near Fonda's Bush, Sir William and I had marked greater flights, lasting more than an hour.
This and Warlock's narrow escape from being bitten by one of those red snakes which pilot the rattlesnake and go blind in September were the only two noteworthy incidents of the first two days' journey on the Boston highway.
On the third day Warlock cast both hind shoes, and I was obliged to lead him very carefully, mile after mile, until, towards sundown, I entered a little village, where in a smithy a forge reddened the fading daylight.
The smith, a gruff man, gave me news of Boston, that the Port Bill was starving the poor and driving all decent people towards open rebellion. As for himself, he said that he meant to march at the first drum-beat and carry his hammer if firelocks were lacking.
He spoke sullenly and with a peculiar defiance, doubtless suspicious of me in spite of my buckskins. I told him that I knew little concerning the wrongs of Boston, but that if any man disturbed my native country, the insolence touched me as closely as though my own door-yard had been trampled. Whereat he laughed and gave me a brawny, blackened fist to shake. So I rode away in the dusk.
To make up for the delay in travelling afoot all day, I determined to keep on until midnight, Warlock being fit and ready without effort; so I munched a quarter of bread to stay my stomach and trotted on, pondering over the past, which already seemed years behind me.
The moon came up, but was soon frosted by silvery shoals of clouds. Then a great black bank pushed up from the west, covering moon and stars in sombre gloom, touched now and again by the dull flicker of lightning. The storm was far off, for I could hear no thunder, though the increasing stillness of the air warned me to seek the first shelter offered.
The district through which I was passing was well populated, and I expected every moment to see some light shining across the road from possibly hospitable windows. So I kept a keen outlook on every side, while the fields and woods through which I passed grew ominously silent, and that delicate perfume which arises from storm-threatened herbage filled my nostrils.
After a while, far away, the low muttering of thunder sounded, setting the air vibrating, and I cast Warlock free at a hand-gallop.
Imperceptibly the dark silence around turned into sound; a low, monotonous murmur filled my ears. It rained.