Cardigan

"Oh yes," I said, bitterly; "I ought to know."

"What do you know about Jack Mount?" he asked.

"I? Nothing – that is, nothing except what everybody knows."

"Well, what does Mister Everybody know?" he inquired, sneeringly.

"They say he takes the King's highway," I replied. "There's a book about him, printed in Boston."

"With a gibbet on the cover," interrupted the big fellow, impatiently. "Oh, I know all that. But don't they say he's a rebel?"

"Why, yes," I replied; "everybody knows he set fire to the King's ship, Gaspee, and started the rebels a-pitching tea overboard from Griffin's Wharf."

I stopped short and looked at him in amazement. He was Jack Mount! I did not doubt it for one moment. And there was the famous Weasel, too – that little, shrivelled comrade of his! – both corresponding exactly to their descriptions which I had read in the Boston book, ay, read to Silver Heels, while her gray eyes grew rounder and rounder at the exploits of these so-called "Minions of the Moon."

"Well," asked the forest runner, with a chuckle, "do you still think yourself lucky?"

I managed to say that I thought I was, but my lack of enthusiasm sent the big fellow into spasms of smothered laughter.

"Now, now, be sensible," he said. "You know you've a belt full of gold, a string of good wampum in your sack, and as pretty a rifle as ever I saw. And you still think yourself in luck? And you're supping with Jack Mount? And the Weasel's watching everything from yonder hazel-bunch? And Saul Shemuel's pretending to be asleep under that pine-tree? Why, Mr. Cardigan, you amaze me!" he lisped, mockingly.

So the little Hebrew had recognized me after all. I swallowed a lump in my throat and rose to my elbow. With Jack Mount beside me, Walter Butler prowling outside the fire-ring, and I alone, stripped of every weapon, what in Heaven's sight was left for me to do? Truly, I had jumped into that same fire which burns below all frying-pans, and presently must begin a-roasting, too.

"So they say I take the King's highway, eh?" observed Mount, twiddling his great thumbs over his ramrod and digging his heels into the pine-needles.

"They say so," I replied, sullenly.

He burst out petulantly: "I never take a rebel purse! The next fool you hear call me a cut-purse, tell him that to stop his mouth withal!" And he fell a-muttering to himself: "King's highway, eh? Not mine, not his, not yours – oh no! – but the King's. By God! I'd like to meet his Majesty of a moonlight on this same highway of his!"

He turned roughly on me, demanding what brought me into the forest; but I shook my head, lips obstinately compressed.

"Won't tell, eh?" he growled.

An ugly gleam came into his eyes, but died out again as quickly; and he shrugged his giant's shoulders and spat out a quid of spruce-gum he had been chewing.

"One thing's plain as Shemuel's nose yonder," he said, jerking a big thumb towards the sleeping peddler; "you're a King's man if I'm a King's highwayman, and I'll be cursed if you go free without a better accounting than a wag o' your head!"

Cade Renard, the Weasel, had come up while Mount was speaking, and his bright little eyes gleamed ruby red in the fire-glow as he scanned me warily from head to toe.

"What's his business?" he inquired of Mount. "I've searched his pack again, and I can't find anything except the wampum belts."

At this naïve avowal I jumped up angrily, forgetting fear, demanding to know by what right he dared search my pack; but the impassive Weasel only blinked at Mount and chewed a birch-leaf reflectively.

"What is he, Jack?" he asked again, turning towards me, as though I had been some new kind of bird.

"Don't know," replied Mount; "not worth the plucking, anyhow. Take his wampum belts, all the same," he added, with a terrific yawn.

"If you are a patriot," I said, desperately, "you will leave me my belts and meddle only with your own affairs."

Both men turned and looked at me curiously.

"You are no patriot," said Mount, after a silence.

"Why not?" I persisted.

"Ay – ay – why and why not?" yawned Mount. "I don't know, if you won't tell. The devil take you, for aught I care! But you won't get your belts," he added, slyly, watching me askance to note the effect of his words.

"Why not?" I repeated, choking down my despair.

"Because you'll talk with your belts to some of these damned Indians hereabouts," he grinned, "and I want to know what you've got to say to them first."

"I tell you that my belts mean no harm to patriots!" I repeated, firmly. "You say I am no patriot. I deny it; I am a better patriot than you, or I should not be in this forest to-day!"

"You are not a patriot," broke in Cade Renard; "you have proved it already!"

"You say that," I retorted, "because Jack Mount, the highwayman, gives me the Boston greeting – 'God save our country!' – and I do not reply? What of it? I'm at least patriot enough not to pretend to be one. I am patriot enough not to rob my own countrymen. I can say 'God save our country!' as well as you, and I do say it, with better grace than either of you!"

The men exchanged sullen glances.

"That password is not fit for spies," said Mount, grimly.

"Spy? You take me for a spy?" I cried, in astonishment. "Well, if you are the famous Jack Mount, you've duller wits than people believe."

"I've wit enough left to keep an eye on you," he roared, starting towards me; but the Weasel laid his little, rough claw on the giant's arm, and at the same moment I saw a dark figure step just within the outer fire-ring, holding up one arm as a sign of peace. The man was Walter Butler. I dropped back softly into the shadow of the thicket.

Slowly Jack Mount strolled around the rim of the fire-circle, rifle lying in the hollow of his left arm. He halted a few paces from Butler and signed for him to remain where he stood. There was no mistaking that signal, for it was a Mohawk sign, and both men understood that it meant "Move and I shoot!"

"Well, Captain Butler," he drawled, "what can I do for you?"

"You know me, sir?" replied Butler, without the faintest trace of surprise in his colourless voice.

"Ay, we all know you," replied Mount, quickly; "even in your Iroquois dress."

"May I inquire your name, sir?" asked Butler, with that deathly grimace which was his smile.

"You may inquire, certainly you may inquire," said Mount, cordially. "You may inquire of my old friend, the moon. Gad, she knows me well, Captain Butler!"

After a silence Butler said: "You unintentionally misled me last evening, friend. The man I follow did not cross the river as you supposed."

"Really?" cried Mount, smiling.

There came another silence, then Butler spoke again:

"I am here on business of my Lord Dunmore; I am here to arrest a young man who is supposed to lie hidden in your camp. I call on you, sir, whoever you are, to aid me in execution of the law."

"The law! Gad, she's another acquaintance o' mine, the jade!" said Mount, laughing. "I suppose you bring that pretty valentine of hers – what some people call a warrant – do you not, Captain Butler?"

"I do," said Butler, moving forward and holding out a paper. Mount took it, and, while he read it, he deliberately shoved Butler back with his elbow to where he had been standing, crowded him back before his huge, outstretched arm, coolly scanning the warrant the while. And Butler could not avoid the giant save by retreating, step by step, beyond the dull red circle, and out against the sky-line, where a bullet could scarcely miss him.