CHAPTER I BRUNO CARRIES A MESSAGE "Down! Bruno, down!" These words were uttered in a guarded whisper by a boy about seventeen years of age, to a great dog that stood by his side. At the word of command, the dog crouched down, his whole body quivering with excitement. His master gently patted him on the head, and whispered, "There, there, old fellow, don't get nervous. Our lives would not be worth much, if we were discovered." The boy was lying full length on the ground, concealed in a dense thicket, but from his point of vantage he had a full view of the road which ran a few yards in front of him. This road ran north and south, and nearly in front of where he lay another road entered it, coming in from the west. The cause of the dog's excitement was apparent, for coming up the road from the west was a large body of horsemen, and a motley troop they were. They were mostly dressed in homespun, and armed with all sorts of weapons, from cavalry sabers to heavy knives fashioned out of files by some rude blacksmith; the army musket, the squirrel rifle, and the shotgun were much in evidence. As the head of the column reached the north and south road the leader called a halt, and looked up and down the road, as if expecting some one. He did not have long to wait. The sound of the swift beating of horse-hoofs was heard from the south, and soon three men came riding up. One, a man of distinguished looks and military bearing, was a little in advance of the other two. As he came up, the leader of the little army saluted him awkwardly and exclaimed, "Glad to see you, Colonel. What news?" "Glad to see you, Captain Poindexter," replied the Colonel. "I see you are on time. As for the news, all goes well. Within a week all Missouri will be ablaze, and the hottest place for Yankees in all Christendom. How many men have you, Captain?" "About five hundred, and more coming in all the time." "So that is Jim Poindexter, the bloody villain," muttered the boy between his set teeth, and nervously fingering his revolver. "How I would like to take a shot at him! But it would not do. It would be madness." The next question asked by the Colonel, whose name was Clay, and who had been in the State for the past two months promoting the partisan uprising, was, "Where is Porter?" "At Brown's Springs. I am to join him there tonight. But he was to meet me here with a few followers, knowing you were to be here." "Good! I will be more than pleased to see him," answered Colonel Clay. "But I thought he was farther north." "Most of his force is," answered Poindexter. "But he promised to meet me at Brown's Springs with five hundred followers. We have our eye on Fulton. My spies report it is garrisoned by less than a hundred men. Fulton captured, I can supply my men with both clothes and arms, and then Jefferson City next." "Jefferson City?" asked Colonel Clay in surprise. "Do you look that far?"