he lad understand that his British friends were retreating.

"And after that has been done?" Horry asked as if counting that he must
continue to obey me however the circumstances might be changed.

"When you have released Abel you may go whithersoever you please."

"And do you count that the time will never come, Fitzroy Hamilton, when
I can repay you, Saul Ogden and that French boy for what you have done?"
the young Tory cried as soon as I had removed the bonds from his hands,
his courage reviving immediately he was free of limb, and the anger
which he had been bottling up while he was helpless, pouring from his
mouth in a torrent of words as he threatened this, that and the other,
which should come to me and mine.

"I have no care as to what you can do, Horry Sims," I said, holding him
by the shoulder so he should not be able to leave until I had given him
due warning. "Remember you this, that the next time you come across my
path with any intent of evil, or with any token that you would raise
your hand against me, from that moment what you have already suffered as
a prisoner will be as nothing compared with the punishment we lads will
deal out. Now that your friends the Britishers are being driven from the
soil of Virginia your fangs are gone. If you have any commonsense in
that Tory head of yours you will keep a still tongue, and never raise
your hand against any of the people in this colony."

Then I released the cur, and watched for an instant to see that he went
straight back toward the cabin, after which I turned about to rejoin
Uncle 'Rasmus, and at that instant it was as if all nature had suddenly
been convulsed.

Because of my excitement, and owing to the fact that I was so intent
upon that which was to be done, I had given no heed to the tokens in
the sky, and the clouds may have been gathering half an hour or more
without my knowledge. Certain it is, however, that on the instant, and
suddenly as the lightning's flash, came the roar of a tempest that shook
the half-ruined houses nearabout until the last timbers were overthrown,
and I was forced to exert all my strength in order to stand against that
furious blast. Then came peal upon peal of thunder, which drowned the
roaring of the guns, for our people were yet firing upon the doomed
village in order to show the Britishers that they were on the alert.

The vibration of the thunder had hardly died away when the lightning
flashed great sheets of flame a