I laughed in my sleeve, and gave him the wall, as a poor dependent on his bounty should; and, reckoning again without my host, wondered how long it would take poor Champe to get within such easy gripping distance of his quarry. As we passed northward and eastward, quite to the other side of the town, and well beyond the burned area Arnold put me through my deserter’s catechism, which now, since I had danced through it gaily once for Castner, and again for Sir Henry, came off the tongue as glibly as a schoolboy’s lesson. It was in front of a rather stately house facing an open space that we paused finally, and I saw a woman come and open the door and close it again quickly when she saw there were two of us. I had but a glimpse of the woman’s face, but that was enough. No one who had ever seen Margaret Shippen would fail to recognize her even though she appeared, as she did to me in that door-opening glimpse, in the guise of a sweet young woman prematurely saddened and aged by sorrow unnamable. But another thing I saw which disturbed me even more than the sight of poor Peggy Shippen’s face; disturbed me so greatly that I scarcely heard the traitor’s question which gave me the opportunity I had been flattering him for. The distracting thing was a fleeting glimpse of another fair face at an upper window of the house; a clean-cut profile appearing for a single instant behind the leaded panes, and then vanishing so quickly that I began to doubt that it had been there. Now I could have sworn upon a stack of Bibles that there was only one face in all the world that could have flung that profile outline upon any window that was ever glazed, and that face I had left safely behind me in Virginia. Could it be possible--but no, it was only a fancied resemblance, I told myself; and then I flogged my wits into line again in time to answer Arnold’s leave-taking query that had been all but lost in the sudden jangle of emotions. “What can you do for me, Mr. Arnold?” I echoed. “That is for you to determine. From what Sir Henry Clinton said, or rather hinted at, I hoped you might be able to make use of me in some way. But I shall be at my best if you keep me near your person, sir. Of that I am very sure.” Again he swallowed the bait like a greedy gudgeon. “You shall come to me at my headquarters this afternoon, Mr. Page,” he said, with the air of one of the great ones of earth dealing out largesse to a reverent and admiring vassal; and then he ascended the steps and the door was opened quickly for him by the woman who stood inside.