Hadley Morris was a brawny youth for his age, which was seventeen. He was by no means handsome, and few boys would be attractive-looking in the clothing of a stable boy. Yet there was that in his carriage, in the keenness of his eye, in the firm lines of his chin and lip, which would have attracted a second glance from any thoughtful observer. Hadley had been now more than a year at the Three Oaks Inn, ever since it had become too unpleasant for him to longer remain with his uncle, Ephraim Morris, a Tory farmer of the neighborhood. Hadley was legally bound to Ephraim, better known, perhaps, as “Miser Morris,” and, of course, was not permitted to join the patriot army as he had wished. The youth might have broken away from his uncle altogether had he so desired, but there were good reasons why he had not yet taken this decisive step. He had found it impossible to live longer under his uncle’s roof, however, and therefore had gone to work for Jonas Benson; but he still considered himself bound to his uncle, and Jonas grumblingly paid over to the farmer the monthly wage which the boy faithfully earned. Hadley found occasion oft and again to further the cause which in his soul he espoused. It was he rather than the landlord who saw to it that the fleetest horse in the stable was ready saddled against the expected arrival of one of those dispatch-bearers whose coming and going had disturbed Colonel Knowles the night before. As he now tightened the girth of the mare’s trappings she danced about as though eager to be footing it along the stage road toward the river. Hadley was startled by the sudden appearance of the colonel’s servant in the doorway of the barn. “So you are riding hout, too?” observed the latter, going toward the stalls occupied by his master’s thoroughbreds. “There’s a deal of going back and forth ’ere, hit seems to me.” “Oh, it’s nothing so lively as it was before the war broke out,” Hadley explained, good-naturedly. “Then the coaches went out thrice a week to Trenton, and one of the New York and Philadelphia stages always stopped here, going and coming. Business is killed and the country is all but dead now.” William grunted as he backed out one of the carriage horses and threw his master’s saddle upon it. “You’re going out yourself, I see.” Hadley said, observing that the man did not saddle the colonel’s charger. “Hi’ve got to give the beasts some hexercise if we’re goin’ ter lie ’ere day hafter day,” grumbled William, and swung himself quickly into the saddle. The boy went to the open door and watched him ride heavily away from the inn, with a puzzled frown upon his brow. “He’s never going for exercise such a hot afternoon as this,” muttered the youth. “There! he’s put the horse on the gallop. He’s going somewhere a-purpose--and he’s in haste. Will he take the turn to the Mills, I wonder, or keep straight on for Trenton?”