There was no hope of escape, and for a while the wretched little group talked in whispers, each nobly endeavoring to cheer and comfort the others. None had rested much on the previous night, and finally Barnabas and McNicol fell asleep.
Nathan was now alone with his thoughts, and in the face of death his fortitude almost deserted him, and his mind yielded to bitter anguish. He lived the past over again—his boyhood days here in the valley, his years at college in Philadelphia, and then the string of terrible events that had begun with the loss of his father on Monmouth battle-field. But amid the conflicting thoughts that distressed him the memory of Godfrey's strange words was uppermost.
"What can it mean?" the lad asked himself. "Is it possible that Major Langdon sent Simon Glass here to find and steal these papers? He heard my father tell me where they were, but why would he want to get them? It is a deep mystery—one too incredible to be true!"
Vainly the lad puzzled himself, and at last he fell into a restless sleep. A couple of hours later he awoke with a start, realizing at once where he was, and dreading to find that dawn had come. The moon was far down and under a bank of clouds, and the cabin had long ago burnt itself out to the last spark. But, from the direction of the ruins, floated a dull noise and the sound of low voices.
"Barnabas, are you awake?" Nathan whispered.
"Yes, lad," muttered the old man, and as he spoke McNicol opened his eyes and twisted his cramped body.
Before more could be said the bushes rustled, and a dusky figure shouldering a musket crept softly into the thicket. Godfrey—for it was, indeed, he—put a finger to his lips. "Hush!" he whispered. "I've come to save you. All are sleeping, except Glass and four of the Indians. They're poking about in the ashes of the cabin, and we must get away before they return. I am going with you, for my life is equally in danger."
He stooped down with a knife in one hand, and quickly severed the cords that held the prisoners. "Now come," he added. "Look where you step, and don't even breathe loudly."
Nathan and his friends rose, trembling with joy, and almost doubting the reality of their good fortune. But they knew by what extreme caution safety must be won, and as noiselessly as shadows they trailed their sore and stiffened bodies behind Godfrey to the farther edge of the thicket.
The young officer had thought out his plans beforehand, and with a warning gesture he stepped into the spring at the point where it became a narrow rivulet, and brawled its course swiftly across the lower corner of the clearing. The others followed, and the murmur of the waters drowned what slight noise was unavoidable.