“The British,” he continued, “will be on us very soon.”
“Not at New Orleans?” she paled. “Everybody says at Pensacola or Mobile, if at all.”
“Everybody knows but little,” said the General, quietly. “My dear, I am going to have to whip them at New Orleans, and that before anybody dreams of.”
“Oh, General—my mother—”
“Now if I had my way,” he went on, “I would rather you stay here awhile, for the British, whom I shall have to fight, are the same that are beating Bonaparte allies in Spain, and the depredations they have committed there have been notorious. But you must, of course, go on to your mother—but for that Mrs. Jackson and I should not think of permitting you to leave us, for it will be a fight to the finish at New Orleans and—”
“I thank you so much for telling me this, General. I shall tell mother as soon as I arrive, and we shall pack up everything so as to be prepared for flight.”
The General rose quickly, his keen eyes flashing and his face purpling with rage.
“Prepare for flight? Do you think I have told you my official business to scare you? Do you think those damned ruffians will ever get to New Orleans except over the dead bodies of me and my troops? I’ll drive them into the river, what is left of them, and you shall be there to see it. By the Eternal, I swear it, and you shall see the river red with their bloating carcasses! I’ll pay off the score they have piled on us on the lakes and at Washington and on the sea. Prepare for flight!” he said, cooling down, “why, my dear, and you old Joe Templeton’s daughter!”
He sat down, blowing his nose vigorously. He looked around half shamedly. She could almost see the purple anger retiring before the mastery of a mind whose first great instinct was unmeasured calmness—a calmness which, in spite of his nature, he could command when he wished at all times. A man who could both bluff and fight.
“No,” he went on, after awhile, “prepare to stay. I hate to see you go, but aside from the fact that there will be some very extraordinary fighting, which you will have nothing to do with, and need not see, New Orleans will be as safe as the Hermitage.”