In Hostile Red Part 38

There was no cessation of the work for hours, and we continued our circuit, stirring up alarm after alarm, Wildfoot, sleepless and untiring, at our head. At last when day was bright, and our three bands had reunited, he looked at the rising sun and said, with a deep sigh of regret:--

"I'm afraid we'll have to quit and go back to General Was.h.i.+ngton's camp."

"Don't you think that we've had rather an active night?" I asked.

"It's been a fair average night," he replied.

Such was the man.

When the sun was well risen, we were riding into camp.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN--_Pure Gold_

I was so sleepy and tired that I practically fell from my horse when we reached quarters; but I had slept only three or four hours when a messenger from General Was.h.i.+ngton himself came to me, bearing instructions for me to go to John Desmond's house in Philadelphia with ten armed men and bring what he would give. I was to show Mr. Desmond a sealed order which the messenger brought.

The armed men were waiting, and I rode at their head to John Desmond's house, wondering what the nature of my errand could be. Yet my ill-humor at being awakened so early had vanished when I found where I was to go.

It was Mr. Desmond's residence, not his counting-house, and I found him in the parlor, where I gave him a note. He was not alone. He sat at one side of a wide table and on the other side was a man whom I knew to be a trusted aide of General Was.h.i.+ngton. Between them lay a heap of s.h.i.+ning gold of English and French coinage, and they were counting it. It was a fine yellow heap, one of the most luscious sights that I had beheld in a long time, and my eyes lingered over it.

"It is this that you are to take," said Mr. Desmond, with a smile, and indicating the gold, when he had read my sealed order.

"For what is it?" I could not restrain myself from asking.

"For the cause," he replied. "It is the contribution of some of Philadelphia's merchants and bankers to the Continental army. They have awaited this opportunity a long time."

I suspected that his own contribution was the largest of all, and such I afterwards found to be the truth.

"It is well to be exact," continued Mr. Desmond, "and so we are counting it in order that Captain Reade here may give us a receipt for the exact amount. It will take us more than a half hour yet to finish the task, and you might walk into the garden while you are waiting."

He indicated the way, and going into the garden I found Mary Desmond there. She wore June roses on her shoulder, their pink and red gleaming against her white dress, and her face was bright. The charm of her eyes did not depart in the daylight.

"So you have come back unharmed," she said. "But you have returned early."

"We have not fought the battle yet," I replied.

"But you look worn," she said. "Have you not seen service?"

"Yes," I replied, "I have spent a night on duty with Wildfoot."

"I might have known," she replied, as she laughed. "That man never sleeps--at least not in the night. He is always seeking to do something for our cause, which may have friends more powerful, but never better."

"I know it," I replied earnestly.

We walked on between the flower beds. It was just such another garden as that at the Tory's house, in which we had talked at cross-purposes after our night's ride, but somehow we seemed to understand each other much better here. The atmosphere was different.

I began to tell her of our night with Wildfoot, and first of our visit to the lonely house where Mother Melrose challenged the Hessian. Her eyes filled and grew tender.

"I know her well," she said, "and she is as loyal and true as Wildfoot himself. She has been one of the links in our chain of communication with the American army, as perhaps Wildfoot told you. I have left messages there myself more than once, and sometimes I have urged her to go away to a safer place. But she seems never to be afraid in that lonely house!"

I looked with admiration at this young girl who spoke with such praise of another's bravery, but was unconscious of her own.

"But if Mrs. Melrose should be afraid there," I said, "should not you be afraid to ride alone, at night, in our service through the dangerous forests?"

"I never thought of that," she replied simply. "I had ridden all about Philadelphia before the war, and I knew the country. It seemed easy for me to go, and I was sure that none would ever suspect me, I claimed to be such an ardent Tory, and I seemed to be all that I claimed. Then we needed friends in Philadelphia."

"In truth we found the best," I replied with earnestness.

She blushed, but did not look wholly displeased.

"You flatter like a courtier, Lieutenant Chester," she said, "and this is too grave a time for flattery."

"But were you never afraid?" I persisted.

"Once I was," she said, "when some hors.e.m.e.n, I know not whether they were soldiers or robbers, pursued me. They followed me five miles; but my horse was too swift, and when they saw the lights of the picket they turned back. I had a pa.s.s from Sir William Howe, but I know that my hand trembled when I showed it to the sentinels. I was too ill to leave our house the next day, but I went again a week afterward."

I looked with increasing wonder and admiration at the slender figure that could dare so much. If our women even were so brave, surely our cause could not fail!

"Why did you talk so strangely to me when we met for the first time after that night's ride together?" I asked. "Why did you seem to have forgotten it or to pretend that it had never been?"

"I did not know who and what you were as well then as I do now; Captain Wildfoot did not tell me," she replied. "One, perforce, had to be cautious then, Lieutenant Chester."

"But were you not afraid that I would betray you after that ride we took together."

"I was sure you would not do so."

"Why?"

She looked me directly in the eyes for a moment, and then turned her face away. But she was not so quick that I did not see the red coming into her cheeks.

We walked on among the roses in the golden suns.h.i.+ne, and the time was all too short for me.

"Will you not wish me success in the coming battle?" I asked, when they called me to take the gold.

"Yes, and you may wear my colors, if they will last long enough," she said. She took one of the roses from her shoulder, and pinned it on my coat. As she bent her head over the rose, silken strands of her hair blew in my face.

I forgot myself then, but I have no excuse for it now. I bent down suddenly and kissed her. She sprang away from me, uttering a little cry, and her cheeks were flaming red.

"Mary," I said, "I don't ask any forgiveness. I kissed you because I could not help myself. You were not afraid that I would betray you after that ride to the American army, and it was because you knew that I loved you. No, I would not have betrayed you even had I been Lieutenant Melville, the British officer that I seemed to be. But much as I loved you then, I love you more now. Mary, will you marry me?"

An elusive smile came into her eyes, as she made me a pretty bow, and replied: "Lieutenant Melville of Newton-on-the-Hill, Staffords.h.i.+re, England, I thank you for your offer, but I have resolved never to marry an Englishman."

Then, before I could stay her, she ran into the house. But she had left her rose with me, and I did not despair.

I carried the gold to General Was.h.i.+ngton, and our main force pressed forward a little later in pursuit of the British army.