ALBOT FROST paused on the crest of Storm Mountain and looked across the lonely Oakland Valley spread out before him.
He had traveled a clean hundred miles through the forest, swimming rapid streams, dodging Indians and Tories, and ever on the alert for his enemies, who were equally vigilant in their search for him.
He eluded them all, however, for Frost, grim and grizzled, was a veteran backwoodsman who had been a border scout for a score of years or more, and he knew all the tricks of the cunning Iroquois, whose ambition was to destroy every white person that could be reached with rifle, knife, or tomahawk.
Frost had been engaged on many duties for the leading American officers, but he was sure that to-day was the most important of all; for be it known that he carried, hidden in the heel of his shoe, a message in cipher from General George Washington himself.
Frost had been promised one hundred dollars in gold by the immortal leader of the American armies, if he would place the piece of cipher writing in the hands of Colonel Nick Hawley, before the evening of the tenth day of August, 1777.
To-day was the tenth, the afternoon was only half gone, and Fort Defiance, with its small garrison under the command of Hawley, was only a mile distant in Oakland Valley. The vale spread away for many leagues to the right and left, and was a couple of miles wide at the point where the small border settlement was planted, with its stockade fort and its dozen families clustered near.
“Thar’s a good three hours of sunlight left,” muttered the veteran, squinting one eye toward the sultry August sky, “and I orter tramp to the fort and back agin in half that time. I’ll be thar purty quick, if none of the varmints trip me up, but afore leavin’ this crest, I’d like to cotch the signal fire of young Roslyn from over yender.”
General Washington considered the message to Colonel Hawley so important that he had sent it in duplicate; that is to say, two messengers concealed the cipher about their persons and set out by widely different routes to Fort Defiance, in Oakland Valley.
Since the distance was about the same, and it was not expected that there would be much variation in speed, it was believed that, barring accidents, the two would arrive in sight of their destination within a short time of each other.