Not until we were so far from the redcoats’ camp that there could be no danger our words might be overheard, however hot the discussion which was to ensue should become, did Gabriel halt, and I was eager to take advantage of this first opportunity of showing disapproval at our thus beating a retreat, as it were. “It’s not for me to say what you and Archie shall do,” Gabriel began immediately he halted, and before I could so much as give words to the petulant thoughts in my mind. “As for myself, I see no good reason why we should linger near that encampment, and much cause for leaving as soon as possible.” “Now you are answering a protest which has come into your own mind,” I cried, not a little irritated because he had taken the words out of my mouth, and he replied quietly: “Ay, William Rufus, that is exactly what I am doing, for even though the night is none too light, I can see that you are disgruntled because I led you away from a place of danger. It needs not that you shall at all times proclaim your dissatisfaction by words, for I can read much of what is in your mind by the movement of your body.” “And you would not have read my thought so easily but for the fact that you yourself must have questioned whether it was fitting for lads who count on becoming soldiers, to turn tail at the first show of danger,” I replied hotly, and he irritated me yet further by saying, in what sounded to me like a tone of superiority: “How would it have advantaged us in any way to lie hidden in front of yonder camp-fire watching the redcoats and that miserable cur, Seth Hastings? Was the picture so inviting that you would linger in order to gaze upon it? And when it was come daylight, if so be you loitered till then, what about the chance of your being discovered when old Peter brings up the horses, for I dare venture to say the negro will start at the first crack of dawn if we have not then returned?” “How would it advantage us?” I cried hotly, allowing myself to be angered because in that time of danger he remembered to call me “William Rufus.” “By remaining there we might perchance have learned the destination of the troop, which seems necessary, since the force is travelling in the same direction we desire to go.” “But we know as much as is needed,” Archie Gordon broke in, and I understood on the instant that he approved of Gabriel’s plan, whatever it might be. “That Seth Hastings is with the men tells beyond a doubt, at least so it seems to me, that they are heading for the rendezvous selected by General Marion, in the hope of capturing not only him, but us lads as well.” “Ay, Archie Gordon, there you have hit the nail squarely as I would have struck it,” Gabriel chimed in. “There was no reason for us to linger longer after having seen that traitorous cur, and good cause, as the matter presents itself to my mind, for us to make all speed with our backs turned toward the enemy.”