"A pretty reception you give your brother," exclaimed the young man.
"Why, Zenas!" cried Katharine, throwing her arms ground him, and giving him a kiss that more than made amends for the slap, "how you frightened me; you naughty boy. I thought it was one of those Yankee soldiers. They often come begging for cream or cherries, and get more impudent every day."
"They won't come again, very soon," said Zenas, with all his old assurance. "We will lock them up safe enough in Fort George, and soon drive them back to their own side of the river. But give us something to eat. I'm hungry as a wolf. Where's father?"
"In the ten-acre wheat field. He has to work too hard for his years, and can get no help for love or money," answered Kate, as she set before her brother on the great kitchen table a loaf of homemade bread, a pat of golden butter, a pitcher of rich cream, and a heaped platter of fragrant strawberries just brought in from the garden.
"Didn't I say I'd be back to get in the wheat? And you see I've kept my word," said the lad. "This is better than campfare," he went on, as the strawberries and cream rapidly disappeared with the bread and butter. "I have a message for you, Kate. Who do you suppose it is from?" said the rather raw youth, with a look that was intended to be very knowing.
"If it's from the camp," replied Kate, calmly, "I know no one there except Captain Villiers and Mr. Trueman. Is it from either of them?"
"Trueman is a first-rate fellow—a regular brick, you know, even if he is a preacher. You ought to have seen how he stood up for them Yankee prisoners, and got our fellows to share their rations with them, although he had helped to bag the game himself. But the message is not from him, but from the captain. He says you saved his life twice,—once nursing him when he was sick, and once by keeping those Yankee scouts here, while we got away. We heard all about your adventure. Well, he's gone to help Proctor in Michigan, and might never come back, he said, and he asked me would I give you this, in case he fell, to show that he was not ungrateful; but I had better give it to you now, or I will be sure to lose it. I can't carry such trumpery in my saddle-bags;" and he handed his sister a small jewel-case. Katharine opened it, and saw an elegant cross, set with gems, lying on a purple velvet cushion.
"He said his mother gave it to him when he was leaving home," continued Zenas. "She was kind of High Church, I guess, and they're most the same as Catholics. He said he had a sort of presentiment that he'd get killed in the war, and he didn't want some wild Indian to snatch it from his body with his scalp, and give to his dusky squaw."
Kate stood looking at the jewel, and knitting her brow in thought. At length she said, "I'll keep it for him till he comes back, as I am sure he will; and if he should not," and her voice quivered a little, for her tender woman's heart could not but shudder at the thought of a violent death,—"I will send it to his mother. I wrote to her for him when he was wounded,—Melton Lodge, Berkshire, is the address. But I will not anticipate his death in battle. I feel certain that he will come back."
As the British lines were drawn firmly around Fort George, in which, having repaired the damage caused by the explosion, the Americans were closely beleaguered, Zenas had no difficulty in obtaining leave of absence to help to harvest the wheat. Other militiamen were also available for that service, which was as important as fighting, Colonel Vincent averred, as he gave permission to considerable numbers of his yeoman soldiery to return to their farms, while the others maintained the leaguer of the fort. Soon after the ingathering of the harvest, however, Vincent was compelled, by the re-enforcement of the enemy, to raise the blockade of Fort George, and again to return to his old position at Burlington Heights.