“What might be the news, neighbor?” he demanded.
“Captain Baker has been carried off by the Yorkers!” shouted Nuck, and his words were heard by other night-capped heads at other windows about the inn. “’Squire Munro and some others came and got him out of bed. They’ve driven off toward the Line.”
“’Member Baker’s captured!” The word was taken up by a dozen voices and the settlers dressed hurriedly and ran forth from their houses. Meanwhile Master Fay had aroused certain men who happened to be in his hostelry, as well as the stablemen in the yard. There was a great bustle about the inn. “Boy!” cried the innkeeper to Nuck, who still bestrode Captain Baker’s horse, “do you go and call Isaac Clark and Joe Safford. They’ll have their horses handy–and good horses, too, I’ll be bound. Tell them to come here with saddle and rifle.”
These two men lived at the other end of the village. Nuck routed them out and in fifteen minutes was back with them at the inn. By that time quite a crowd had collected and ten men beside Nuck were found to be mounted and ready to set forth after the Yorkers. Each was a tried Green Mountain Boy and eager to take satisfaction for the attack upon their leader. Ten men were considered ample to attack the Yorkers, and with a promise to the bystanders to recapture ’Member Baker, even though they followed him to Albany, the cavalcade galloped away from the Green Mountain Inn, Enoch riding in their train.
CHAPTER VIII
THE TRAITOR’S WAY
Remember Baker lived at Arlington, and the distance from that new settlement, it could hardly be called a village, to Bennington was about two and a half miles. Enoch Harding might have given the alarm to the neighbors of the captured man, but he knew that they would not be able to pursue the Yorkers, for good horse flesh was scarce outside of Bennington. And Robbie would doubtless rouse them, anyway, as soon as he was recovered from his fright. As he saw it, Enoch believed his duty to point to the Catamount Inn, and we have seen how quickly a company was formed there for the chase of the Yorkers and their prisoner.
Enoch had ridden Baker’s horse hard into town and now he followed behind the ten rescuers, urging the animal to still greater efforts. The hard-packed snow rang merrily under the hoofs of the steeds. Fortunately the boy’s mount had been well “sharpened” by the local smith shortly before, or riding recklessly as he did the horse might have suffered a fall, and Enoch been flung off. Nevertheless he could not keep up with Isaac Clark and his companions, so gradually fell behind. His steed’s wind was sound, however, and he pursued the trail steadily.
The rescuers showed no hesitation in choosing their route. There were but a few beaten trails and they knew the road John Munro and his party would take with the prisoner to the bank of the Hudson. They could not miss it. The road from Arlington broke into this main trail at a point not far beyond the confines of Bennington and there it was at once apparent that the sledge and horsemen had passed that way not long before. There were plain marks of the runners and the ice and snow were cut up by the feet of the flying horses. The fact that the Yorkers numbered as many–if not more–than themselves, did not disturb the Green Mountain Boys in the least. “A Grants man who is not good for two or three of the scurvy Yorkers, is no good at all!” Stephen Fay had declared when they set forth, and probably the only emotions the ten felt as they rode on were eagerness and wrath.
Meanwhile, behind them raced Enoch Harding, desiring mightily to “be in at the death,” as the fox-hunters say. His heavy farmhorse could not compete with the mounts of the possé, however, and with tears in his eyes he saw them increase the distance between themselves and his animal. But he doggedly pursued the road, while the clatter of hoofs grew mellow in the distance. The morning was very still; the moon had sunk now and the stars were fading before the gray light of the coming day. In the east behind him the sky was even streaked with pink above the mountain-tops; the wind blew more keenly and he suddenly awoke to the fact that he was almost perished with the cold, for he had stopped for neither greatcoat nor mittens.