“Indeed, yes; but General Howe will have his revenge when, after this fight to-morrow, he sends the young upstart back to England in chains.”
“That will he. It would be a glorious sight to see our gallant general capture him with his own hands.”
“Oh, Major Grant will attend to that,” she replied loftily. “General Howe will do his share when he receives the prisoners at Chestnut Hill.”
So Chestnut Hill road was to be their route. Richard mentally recorded it, while he said with incisive compliment, “Major Grant has the place of honour.”
The pleasure in her voice when she answered told that the arrow had hit its mark. “Major Grant could have circumvented the rebels with half the five thousand men assigned to him.”
“He takes so many? ’Tis a large force for so skilful an officer, unless, indeed, the enemy should be very strong.”
“Oh, I think they reach not half that number.”
With the hour of starting, the route and the force to be sent, Richard now knew all he had hoped to learn. Grant might return any moment, so that his peril was imminent; and yet the audacity of the adventure gave it such spice that he lingered unwilling, as he was unable to frame an excuse for withdrawing, filling in the pause with comments on the day’s festivities.
“Your company does not go with the attacking party?” she said presently, as though it were something they both knew positively.
“No,” he replied, catching the cue, but wondering which company was supposedly his, and for whom had she taken him.