"You go back from here the way you came," ordered Noel as he swung his prisoner in his arms and, giving him a violent push, sent him in the direction he had indicated. But Levi was not to be so easily turned aside from his purpose. Once more he leaped toward his tormentor, who now had taken the carpet-bag in his hands and stood facing him. Screaming, chattering, lamenting, Levi would have been a pathetic object under other circumstances. But Noel was so thoroughly convinced that in the bag which he held in his hands he would find something of value to the leaders of his army that he was determined now to investigate the contents and compel the little Jew to give it over. Levi's screams of impotent rage and his childish attempts to compel Noel to relax his hold upon the bag were alike without avail. At last the young soldier said more sternly to the angry sutler, "Levi, if you know when you are well off you'll leave this place as I told you. Now, go!" There was something in Noel's voice that caused Levi to heed the command. Tears were coursing down his cheeks and his two little fists were working very much after the manner of a pump-handle when he saw the expression on the face of his captor, and, aware that further efforts would be useless, he abruptly turned away and, without once glancing behind him, sped swiftly toward the fork in the road from which he had come. For a brief time Noel watched the man as he sped across the field, and then suddenly, aware that his own problems were sufficient to demand his entire attention, he turned toward the house in the distance. He had expected to learn from Levi the direction in which the Union troops might be found, but his sudden determination to investigate the carpet-bag, as soon as he discovered that it was not heavy, had changed his plans. Levi was gone and if he possessed the desired information he had taken it with him. And yet Noel Curtis was aware that his own predicament was such that if other bodies of the Confederate cavalrymen should soon pass along the road, Levi would be able to inform them of what had occurred. If his suspicions were correct, that the contents of the carpet-bag were of considerable value, there would be an added incentive for the little sutler to rescue them. Perhaps Noel's decision to start toward the house which he saw in the distance was formed simply because it was the only place within sight which indicated the presence of people. His own plight now was such that he keenly felt the need of food and drink. No little streams were near him, and as for food there were no indications that the shallow soil itself had produced any of late. His determination once fixed, Noel, with the carpet-bag firmly grasped in his hand, moved swiftly across the field toward the distant house.