The fellow grinned. “Oh, a little change of programme mattered not, so we lost not a single wagon of our train. See, they are yonder, as safe as a ship in port.”
“Mayhap; but you saved your skins whole by stealing away from Monmouth like a thief in the night, and, leaving the foe you pretended to despise, camped on the battle-ground.”
“Oh, we begrudge not you fellows a camping ground—we are not that greedy.”
“No; you wanted them, in fact, to have all the ground in the vicinity, even if you had to be so unselfish as to march all night to leave it to them.”
“Come, your tongue’s too sharp,” the fellow said irritably.
“Sharper than your general’s wits, if he took that march out of anything but necessity. He has saved his baggage train, but, mark you, he has lost his cause. Our victory at Monmouth will hearten up the doubtful and send them flocking to our camp.”
The man laughed satirically at the word “victory,” and then said:—
“Well, at all events, your part of the flocking is done for good. ’Tis not likely you’ll see the outside of a prison for more months than you are years old—if by any chance your general hangs on that long, which is not likely.”
Richard shivered at mention of a prison, but shrugged his shoulders with outward calm. “A man must bear the fortunes of war, if he be a true soldier. Prison life is harder than fighting, but some must carry the heavy end of the burden, and ’tis not for me to bemoan if it falls to me. Know you in which of your pest holes we are like to be confined?”