was just going to say, the last lot of tobacco I got--"

"Oh, damn your tobacco!" said the other, jerking his arm from the old
man's tremulous grasp.

"Damn my tobacco?" echoed Mr. Valentine, quite stupefied.

"Yes. I've matters more important on my mind just now."

"The deuce!" cried the old man. "What could be more important than
tobacco?"

And he stood looking into the fire, muttering to himself between
furious puffs.

Colden sought comfort of Miss Sally. "Was ever a woman as unreasonable
as Elizabeth?" he said to her. "She'd have had me lower myself to meet
that rebel vagabond as one gentleman meets another."

But Miss Sally was not going to betray her own disappointment by
showing a change from her oft-expressed opinion of the rebel
captain,--particularly in the presence of Mr. Valentine. So she
answered:

"You met him so once, three years ago."

"I had a less scrupulous sense of propriety then," replied Colden,
raging inwardly.

"But, as he's a rebel and deserter," pursued Miss Sally, "was it not
your duty as a soldier to take him, just now?"

"I'd have done so, had my men been here," growled the major.
"Elizabeth ought to've had her servants hold him. I had half a mind to
order them, in the King's name, but I never can bring myself to oppose
her, she's so masterful! By George, though, I'll have him yet! My two
fellows will soon come up. They shall give chase. He will leave tracks
in the snow."

Colden went to the window, and peered out as Peyton himself had done
not long before. The flakes were coming down as thick as ever.

"I don't see my rascals yet!" he muttered. "They've stopped at the
tavern, I'll warrant."

And he continued to gaze eagerly out, impatient that his men should
arrive before the new-fallen snow should cover his enemy's tracks.

Old Mr. Valentine, having exhausted his present stock of mutterings,
now walked over to Miss Sally, who had sat down near the spinet.

"Miss Williams," said he, "this is the first chance I've had to speak
to you alone in a week."

"But we're not alone," said Miss Sally, motioning her head towards
Colden.

"He's nobody," contemptuously replied the octogenarian. "A man that
damns tobacco is nobody. So you may go ahead and speak out. What's
your answer, ma'am?"

"Oh, Mr. Valentine, not now! You must give me time."

"That's what you said before," he complained.

She had, indeed, said it before, scores of times.

"Well, give me more time, then