"What do you here, child?" he said, hurriedly. "Go quickly, before the British reach us, and tell your father that, Quaker or no Quaker, he shall ride to Washington, on the Brandywine, and tell him that we, but one hundred men, are besieged by three hundred British cavalry in Chichester meeting-house, with but little powder left. Tell him to make all haste to us."
Turning, he hastened into the meeting-house, now converted into a fort, and as the doors closed behind him Betty saw a black muzzle protruding from every window.
With trembling fingers the little maid picked up her sampler, and as the thud of horses' hoofs grew louder and louder, she ran fearfully into the house, locked and bolted the massive door, and then flying up the broad stairs, she seated herself in a little window overlooking the meeting-house yard. She had gone into the house none too soon. Up the road, with their red coats gleaming and their harness jangling, was sweeping a detachment of British cavalry, never stopping until they reached the meeting-house—and then it was too late.
A sheet of flame shot out from the wall before them, and half a dozen troopers fell lifeless to the ground, and half a dozen riderless horses galloped wildly down the road. The leader shouted a sharp command, and the whole troop retreated in confusion.
Betty drew back shuddering, and when she brought herself to look again the troopers had dismounted, had surrounded the meeting-house, and were pouring volley after volley at its doors and windows. Then for the first time Betty thought of the officer's message, and remembered that the safety of the Americans depended upon her alone, for her father was away, no neighbor within reach, and without powder she knew they could not resist long.
Could she save them? All her stern Quaker blood rose at the thought, and stealing softly to the paddock behind the barn, she saddled Daisy and led her through the bars into the wood road, which opened into the highway just around the bend. Could she but pass the pickets without discovery there would be little danger of pursuit; then there would be only the long ride of eight miles ahead of her.
Just before the narrow wood road joined the broader highway Betty mounted Daisy by means of a convenient stump, and starting off at a gallop, had just turned the corner when a voice shouted "Halt!" and a shot whistled past her head. Betty screamed with terror, and bending over, brought down her riding-whip with all her strength upon Daisy, then, turning for a moment, saw three troopers hurriedly mounting.
Her heart sank within her, but, beginning to feel the excitement of the chase, she leaned over and patting Daisy on the neck, encouraged her to do her best. Onward they sped. Betty, her curly hair streaming in the wind, the color now mounting to, now retreating from her cheeks, led by five hundred yards.
But Daisy had not been used for weeks, and already felt the unusual strain. Now they thundered over Naaman's Creek, now over Concord, with the nearest pursuer only four hundred yards behind; and now they raced beside the clear waters of Beaver Brook, and as Betty dashed through its shallow ford, the thud of horse's hoofs seemed just over her shoulder.
Betty, at first sure of success, now knew that unless in some way she could throw her pursuers off her track she was surely lost. Just then she saw ahead of her a fork in the road, the lower branch leading to the Brandywine, the upper to the Birmingham Meeting-house. Could she but get the troopers on the upper road while she took the lower, she would be safe; and, as if in answer to her wish, there flashed across her mind the remembrance of the old cross-road which, long disused, and with its entrance hidden by drooping boughs, led from a point in the upper road just out of sight of the fork down across the lower, and through the valley of the Brandywine. Could she gain this road unseen she still might reach Washington.