She went back to the house. Only a fool would have gone on after that sort of warning. But she did not go indoors. She stood on the step and called. “Come here and talk to me. I’ll listen to what you have to say! Don’t hide like a coward!” But there was no answer. Perhaps when it was still darker they would come. She sat down in her corner of the step and leaned her head against the wall. She would be here if they came, she would--she would--her head nodded and she was asleep. When she woke it was in answer to an abrupt summons. She heard simultaneously another shot and a little sharp crack and some object fell from above upon her head. She thought it was a fluttering bird and put up her hand. But the texture of the object was that of cloth. It was the flag which had been shot at! Elizabeth stood with it in her hands. Colonel Thomas had said that the mountaineers had been in sympathy with the enemies of their country. Was this generation traitorous also? Every fiber of her being stiffened with resentment. Yet, alas! John Baring-- Again she stood on the step and called angrily. “Come and tell me what you want! Don’t hide like a coward!” But whether the watcher was deaf, or whether he was merely a sentinel without power to act or to answer, he made no response. She carried the flag into the house and lighting the lamp, examined it. In it were half a dozen bullet-holes. Then she ate a hastily prepared breakfast and set out into the woods. Once more daybreak was at hand, and this time she would not miss the road to the settlement. CHAPTER VII “MAMMY’S BOY” Herbert Scott was not a coward--indeed, his errand, deep in the woods above the Baring house on the afternoon when Colonel Thomas came to see Elizabeth, proved him courageous. His anonymous and unpleasant communications had not been threats or warnings, but taunts. The mountaineers seemed to have come to the conclusion that he was worth nothing, that he was a mere appendage attached to the proverbial apron-string of his sister. The taunts were never uttered when Elizabeth was within hearing. Herbert, bending over a garden-bed, heard from the woodland a shrill “Mammy’s boy! Mammy’s boy!” then a laugh. At first he had walked directly toward the sound, but he never could see who had uttered it. He knew, sometimes, that the speaker receded before him; there was a rustle in the leaves and underbrush, and sometimes the call was repeated at increasing distances. But more often, he could neither see nor hear a living soul. But now, on the afternoon when he had gone to look up the boundary lines, the taunts changed to a more serious approach. Suddenly he found himself looking into a gun-barrel. He recognized at once the holder of the gun and stood still. He did not throw up his hands or make any sign of surrender, but he felt the blood recede from his heart. “What do you want?” he asked.