th somewhat of fear to the
possibility that the retreating army might be choked before it had
gotten well on its way toward New York.

As the day drew nearer to a close I became painfully nervous, fearing
lest something even at this last hour should prevent my Lord Cornwallis
from carrying out his plans, and seeing the expression of trouble on my
face, understanding perhaps from that which was in his own mind, little
Frenchie whispered to me in a tone of encouragement:

"Don't fret yourself, Fitz Hamilton, fearing lest the red-coats will not
carry out the manoeuvre. They only await the coming of night, when it
will be possible to steal across the river without being seen by our
people, and then you may set it down as a fact that all these valiant
soldiers of the king will make every effort to get out of the way of
that French boy who, as my Lord Cornwallis has said, is striving to
'play war with a handful of rebels.'"

"Then there is in your mind no question but that the retreat is much the
same as begun?" I asked, wanting to hear him confirm that which was in
my mind.

"I can see no evidence of their failing to go on as they have begun,"
the lad replied cheerily, and added as he dropped his voice to a
whisper: "The one chance which may work against us is, that my Lord
Cornwallis will take some steps to prevent any of the people in the
village from carrying word regarding his movements to the Americans,
therefore let us get into some place of hiding, where we may watch all
that goes on here about the river bank without presenting ourselves to
the eyes of the red-coats."

Hardly more than fifty yards from where we were then standing were the
ruins of a house which had been literally torn into fragments by shot
from the American lines. Under these splintered and partially-burned
timbers would it be possible for us to find a fairly good hiding place,
unless peradventure strict search might be made, which was not probable
because so far as we knew, the red-coats had no reason to suspect us as
being other than lads whose parents so loved the king that they had been
willing to remain in the village of York even during the siege.

Saul was not at first inclined to go into hiding. When Pierre told him
what we would do, he declared that it was putting ourselves to useless
trouble, for these gentry who wore red coats no longer had the time nor
the inclination to concern themselves about us; but when little Frenchie
explain