"Bill Mink!" returned the farmer. "What in the world brings you here at this time of night?"
"On a fool's errand, it may be. I received a letter from Loire, about an hour ago, stating that Geiger's daughter had volunteered to carry important despatches to General Sumter; that she had been on the journey some hours; and that I must overhaul her at the risk of every thing."
"It isn't possible!" said the wife of the man called Preston.
"It is, though; and it strikes me that she must be a confounded clever girl."
"It strikes me so, too," returned Preston. "But I rather think your errand will be that of a fool, if you go any farther tonight."
"Have you seen any thing of the jade?" asked Mink in a decided tone.
"Well, perhaps I have," returned Preston, lowering his voice.
"Aha!" ejaculated Mink, throwing himself from his horse. "So I have got on the right track. She is here?"
"I did not say so."
"No matter. It is all the same," and, hitching his horse to the fence, the young man entered the house with the familiarity of an old acquaintance.