Neil saluted and dropped back. As soon as he was at a safe distance he gave a long whistle of surprise. Then he began to laugh. The dismay with which he first thought of concealing his military identity in petticoats gave way to excitement. He began softly to hum the air and words of a rude ballad which celebrated the victory of King’s Mountain, five months before, and was passing from mouth to mouth through the patriot army. “Stop that singing!” a gruff voice said in his ear. “Are you signalling to Cornwallis?” In the darkness it was impossible to see if the speaker were officer or man from the ranks. Neil took the risk and answered like an equal: “Who are you that are giving me orders? I left General Greene ahead there, and just now I’m taking orders direct from him.” “Oh!” the voice returned ironically, but without apparent offense, “then I reckon you’re the great Neil Davidson. I’m merely Joe Gillespie, scout.” “I have heard of you,” Neil said good-naturedly. “The general was speaking of you just now.” “Do you know who was speaking of you lately?” Gillespie asked. He took the boy by the arm and walked along with him through the dark. “That namesake of yours, Sandy Davidson. He’s taken a notion to capture you, and you want to be as wary as you know how. He’s the worst of the Tory bushwhackers, and the most daredevil. If he’s decided to capture you because your name’s the same as his, he’s likely to walk right into Greene’s camp and do it. It’s nothing to him that there’s a reward out for his life.” “I reckon he’ll not find it as easy to catch me as he thinks,” Neil said. A tremor of fierceness came into his voice. He threw back his shoulders, and his companion could feel his arm grow tense. “But if I live long enough I’ll capture him and see him hanged. He has my brother’s name.” “The name is common.” “It shan’t be common among Tories!” the boy declared. “They killed my brother. They shan’t have his name.” “How did they kill him?” Gillespie’s voice was stirred. It was an old story, the loss of life on either side in the bitter Civil War that tore the Carolinas, but it was a story that never found dull ears. “I don’t know,” Neil said. “I was a very little boy and the Indians had carried me off. When I was exchanged and brought home my mother told me that the Tories had killed Sandy. She didn’t say how--she never would tell me how. She’d had so much trouble that she was--well, queer, and she never would tell anything very much. I was so scared and lonesome that I ran away to the Indians, and stayed with them again a long time. Mother was just the same when I came back. She didn’t need me and I couldn’t do anything for her, and that’s why I followed the army to fight the Tories in Sandy’s place. And I don’t intend to let any Tory live with his name.”