“I solemnly swear that I did not see or have any communication whatsoever with Seth Hastings from the time I left him last night bound securely, and have no knowledge whatsoever of how he may have escaped or been spirited away,” Gabriel said, answering first for himself, and then turning to me, put the same question, following it up by naming each lad in turn. Thus it was we Minute Boys swore positively we had no hand whatsoever in the disappearance of the traitor, and I knew beyond a possibility of doubt that each and every one had spoken the truth. Therefore it was there could be no longer any question but that among the men who had sworn to labor earnestly for the Cause was one who stood ready to do whatsoever he might against us. If you can picture to yourself our position, surrounded on every hand by redcoats and Tories who thirsted for our blood,--we the only persons in all the Carolinas who were ready to bear arms against the enemy,--you may have some faint idea of the consternation, ay, the terror, which came upon us with such knowledge. Gabriel lost no time in reporting to his brother the result of the questioning, and while he was absent we lads whispered among ourselves, speaking as people do in the presence of the dead, for already did it seem as if we were doomed. Through the information that had been brought in by those who yet remained friendly to the Cause, we knew that Tarleton with his legion, and Colonel Wemyss in command of not less than a full regiment, were hot in pursuit of us, and if either of these forces should so surround our little band that retreat was impossible, then would we be cut down to the last man, for according to my Lord Clinton’s proclamation, no mercy was to be shown--we were outlaws already doomed to death. Before Gabriel returned, the scouts who had been sent out four and twenty hours in advance of us lads, returned bringing with them such a budget of news as would have raised our spirits to the highest notch, but for the fact that we had among us one who might not be trusted, and who he was it seemed impossible to learn. Each man must perforce look at his neighbor with doubt, and those who were most devoted to the Cause could not but understand that they were liable at any moment to be suspected of traitorous design. It seemed to me as if the efficiency of the force must be weakened until it was possible to discover which of that devoted band was playing the Judas. Now let me set down here what we learned from our lately returned scouts, the information covering all the time from the day when we set free the one hundred and fifty prisoners who refused, save in the case of a few true men, to join our force. Major Wemyss had marched seventy miles from Nelson’s Ferry straight across the district of Williamsburg, devastating a path fifteen miles in breadth after such a merciless fashion that one would have said he had been taught in the school of the savage.