that stern duty had compelled him to injure you, and yet how could
even I ask him to act otherwise than he will do? I know that I ought
not, as a patriot, to give you the warning that I now do. Let me
collect my thoughts and consider by what plan I can best secure your
safety. It would be useless, I fear, to advise you to deliver
yourselves up as prisoners of war, and thus avoid bloodshed. Yet how
can you escape from the trap into which you have run? You smile and
shake your head. I know--I know. You would say that you must try to
fight your way through a host of rebels rather than yield yourselves
prisoners. Your safety consists in the rapidity of your movements."

She was silent for some minutes and then continued--

"There are, as high up as Suffolk, several vessels--a ship, a sloop, and
a brig. Let it be known by any people whom you can fall in with that
you are aware of this fact, and it will naturally be supposed that you
have gone up the river to bring them off or to destroy them. The plan
was to detain you by various stratagems in the river till daylight, when
it was expected that you would easily be cut off and destroyed if you
should attempt to fight your way through the crowds of riflemen lining
each bank of the river, or otherwise that you would be compelled to give
yourselves up as prisoners. I fear me much, I repeat, that this latter
course you will not follow--I know you will not. Then you have only
your speed on which to rely. You will have to run a terrible gauntlet
between well-practised sharpshooters. Start without a moment's delay.
The militia will, I fear, have reached Mackey's Mills before you can get
there; but if, as I hope, they will believe that you have gone up the
stream, they may not be on the watch for you, and you may push by
without being perceived."

Such was the tenor of the words the agitated and alarmed girl poured
out. I felt sure that I could follow no better plan than the one she
suggested. Still it was heart-breaking thus to leave her. I have not
intruded any part of our conversation on my readers relating more
especially to ourselves. She had said all that I could wish to assure
me that her heart was still mine, and I had poured out my own
long-pent-up feelings into her ears. I had been sitting by her side.
She started. A sound was heard in the house--scuffling of feet--a loud
scream--people running here and there. The dog barked loudly outside.
Two black g