One day he learned that she had ordered her horse saddled without consulting him, or inviting him to ride with her. He sent the nag back to the stables, and when she came out habited, she was furious. “You can’t ride alone about these woods,” he said. “Why not? Who’s to harm me?” “What if the horse bolted and flung you against a rock, or fell on you or dragged you? Besides, there are many bad characters hereabouts. Only a mile down the road is a family called Lasher.” “Those poor wretches in that tumbledown hut? Who’s afraid of them?” “They’re descendants of the Cowboys and Skinners who used to murder and torture people here during the Revolution. We’re in the old Neutral Ground, where those hyenas used to prey on patriots and Tories alike. They burned homes, hung old ministers up by the neck to make them tell where their money was, mistreated women—did everything horrible. Major André was captured by some of them just a few miles from here. Those Lashers are sons of one of the worst of the Skinners, and I wouldn’t trust you among them.” When she insisted, he said, “You shall not go!” Three days later he read in his _Herald_ that Mr. Harry Chalender was so far recovered from the cholera that he had gone to recuperate at his farm near the village of Sing Sing, not far from the country seat of Mr. Irving, the well-known writer. Sing Sing was only a few miles away. RoBards handed the paper to his wife, with an accusing finger pointing to the notice. She met his eye with a bland gaze, and said: “I knew it. That is where I wanted to ride. But you wouldn’t let me.” “Why didn’t you ask me to go along with you?” “You don’t like Harry.” This logic dazed him. “Because I don’t like him, you are to visit him secretly?” “But his mother and sisters are there, Mist’ RoBards! Am I to forsake my every friend?” “Friend!” he groaned. And that made her laugh. She flung her arms about him and said: “The only time you’re funny is when you’re mad, Mist’ RoBards. I love you jealous.” A few weeks later when he and Patty came back from a tour of their fields with the farmer, they saw a cariole (a “carry-all,” as she called it) hitched to the post in front of the gate. On the porch they found Chalender, pale, lean, weak, but still smiling. The cry that escaped Patty’s lips was so poignant with welcome that RoBards’ heart went rocking in his breast. If Chalender had been in his usual health, RoBards might have killed him. It was, oddly, wickeder to kill an ill man than a well one. He wanted to challenge the fellow to a duel, but dueling was against the laws of the nation, and latterly against the more powerful laws of fashion. Besides, what excuse could he give for a challenge? And the scandal of it! The newspapers were diabolically scandalous nowadays; foreign travelers said they had never imagined anything so outrageous as the American newspapers.