The sound wrought a transformation in Colden. His face lighted up with malevolent joy.

“You love too late!” he cried, to Elizabeth. “My men are there! They shall take him to New York a prisoner, at last!”

“But not delivered up by me, thank God!” replied Elizabeth, while Peyton rose quickly from his chair, and Colden reeled like a drunken man to the window.

She went behind Peyton, and, with the edge of the broken sword, hacked rather than cut through one of the outer windings that bound his wrists together, whereupon she speedily uncoiled the rope.

“You were my prisoner. I set you free!” she said, dropped the rope to the floor, and handed him the broken sword.

He took the weapon in his right hand, and imprisoned Elizabeth with his left arm.

“I’m more your prisoner now than ever!” he said. “You’ve cut these bonds. Will you put others on me?”

“Sometime,—if we can save your life!” she answered.

Both turned their eyes towards Colden.

The Tory officer had drawn his sword, and was motioning, in great excitement, to his soldiers outside.

“This way, men!” he shouted. “To the front door! Damn the louts! Can’t they understand?” He beat upon the window with his sword, knocking out panes of glass. “Come through that door, I say! Quick, curse you, there’s a prisoner here, with a price for his taking! Ay, that’s it! Some one in the hall there, open the front door to my men!”

The sound now came of knocks bestowed on the outside door, and of Sam’s heavy tread on the hall floor.

“Williams! Sam!” shouted Elizabeth. “Don’t let them in!”

The heavy tread was heard to stop short. The knocking on the outer door was resumed.

“Let them in, I say,” roared Colden, too proud to go himself to the door. “I command it, in the name of the King!”

“Obey your mistress,” cried Peyton, to those in the hall. “I command it, in the name of Congress!”

Colden was silent for a moment, then suddenly threw open the window and called out, “This way, men! Quick!”

And he drew pistol, and stood ready with steel 269 and ball to guard the window by which his men were to enter. A new, wild ferocity was on his face, a new, nervous hardness in his body, as if the latent resolution and strength which a prudent man keeps for a great contest, on which his all may depend, were at last aroused. In such a mood, the man who, governed by interest, may have seemed a coward all his life becomes for the once supremely formidable. At last he thinks the stake worth the play, at last the prize is worth the risk, and because it is so he will play and risk to the end, hazarding all, not yielding while he breathes. Having opened the theme which alone, of all themes, shall transform his irresolution into action, he will, Hamlet like, “fight upon this theme until” his “eyelids will no longer wag.” So was Colden aroused, transfigured, as he stood doubly armed by the window, waiting for his men to clamber in.

“What shall we do, dear?” said Elizabeth.

“Fight!” replied Peyton, tightening at the same time his right palm around his broken sword, and his left around the hand she had let him take,—for she had moved from the embrace of his arm.

“Ay, there are only two of them,” she said, as two burly forms appeared in the open window, one behind the other.

“There will be three of us, you’ll find!” cried Colden. “This time I’ll take a hand, if need be.”

“You must not stay here,” said Peyton to Elizabeth, quickly. “Things will be flying loose in a moment!”

“I won’t leave you!” said she.

“Go! I beg you, go!” he said, releasing her hand, and stepping back.

Meanwhile, Colden’s men bounded in through the window. Rough, sturdy fellows were they, who landed heavily on the parlor floor, and blinked at the light, drawing the while the breeches of their short muskets from beneath their coats. Their hats and shoulders were coated with snow.

“Take that rebel alive, if you can!” ordered Colden. “He’s meant to hang! Stun him with your musket-butts!”

The men quickly reversed their weapons, and strode heavily towards Harry. To their surprise, before they could bring down their muskets, which required both hands of each to hold, Harry dashed forward between them, thinking to cut down Colden with his broken sword, possess himself of the latter’s pistol, shoot one of the soldiers, and meet the other on less unequal terms. He saw a possibility of his leaping through the open window and fleeing on one of the soldiers’ horses, but the idea was accompanied by the thought that Elizabeth might be made to suffer for his escape. Her safety now depended on his getting the mastery over his three would-be 271 captors. So, ere the two astonished fellows could turn, Harry had leaped within sword’s reach of his doubly armed enemy.

But Colden was now as alert as rigid, and he opposed his officer’s sword against Peyton’s broken cavalry blade, guarding himself with unexpected swiftness, and giving back, for Harry’s sweeping stroke, a thrust which only the quickest and most dexterous movement turned aside from entering the Virginian’s lungs. As Harry stepped back for an instant out of his adversary’s reach, the Tory raised his pistol. At the same moment the two soldiers, having turned about, rushed on Peyton from behind. He heard them coming, and half turned to face them. Their movement had for him one fortunate circumstance. It kept Colden from shooting, for his bullet might have struck one of his own men.

Now Elizabeth had not been idle. At the moment when Harry had stepped back from her and bade her go, she had run to the door of the east hall, and called Williams and Sam. While Peyton had been engaging Colden near the window, the steward and the negro had entered the parlor, and she had excitedly ordered them to Peyton’s aid. Williams still had the duck-gun, Sam the pistol. Thus it occurred that, as Peyton half turned from Colden towards the two soldiers, these last-named saw Williams and Sam rush in between them and 272 their prey. Before Williams could bring his duck-gun to bear, he was struck down senseless by one of the musket blows first intended for Peyton. Another blow, and from another musket, had been aimed at Sam’s woolly head, but the negro had put up his left hand and caught the descending weapon, and at the same time had discharged his pistol at the weapon’s holder. But Williams, in falling, had knocked against the darky, and so disturbed his aim, and the ball flew wide. The man who had brought down Williams now struck Sam a terrible blow with the musket-club, on the temple, and the negro dropped like a felled ox.

During this brief passage, Peyton had returned to close quarters with Colden. The latter, who had lowered his pistol when his men had last approached Peyton, and who had resumed the contest of swords unequal in size and kind, now raised the pistol a second time. But it was caught by the hands of Elizabeth, who had run around to his left, and who now, suddenly endowed with the strength of a tigress, wrenched it from him as she had wrenched the broken sword earlier in the evening. She tried to discharge the pistol at one of the two soldiers, as they, relieved of the brief interposition of Williams and Sam, were again taking position to bring down their muskets on Peyton’s head while he continued at sword-work with Colden. But the pistol 273 snapped without going off, whereupon Elizabeth hurled it in the face of the man at whom she had aimed. The blow disconcerted him so that his musket fell wide of Peyton, who at the same instant, having seen from the corner of his eye how he was menaced, leaped backward from under the other descending musket. Then, taking advantage of the moment when the muskets were down, he ran to the music seat before the spinet, and mounted upon it, thinking rightly that the infuriated major would follow him, and that he might the better execute a certain manoeuvre from the vantage of height. Colden indeed rushed after him, and thrust at him, Peyton sweeping the thrusts aside with pendulum-like swings of his own short weapon. His thought was to send the point that menaced him so astray that he might leap forward and cleave his enemy with a downward stroke before the Tory could recover his guard. But Colden pressed him so speedily that he was at last fain to step up from the music seat to the spinet, landing first on the keyboard, which sent out a frightened discord as he alighted on it. Finding the keys an uncertain footing, he took another step, and stood on the body of the instrument, so that Colden would be at the disadvantage of thrusting upwards. But Colden, seeming to tire a little after a few such thrusts, called to his men:

“Shoot the dog in the legs!”

Both men aimed at once. Elizabeth screamed. Peyton leaped down from his height to the little space behind the spinet projection, where he had hidden a week before. Here he found himself well placed, for here he could be approached on one side only,—unless his adversaries should follow his example and come at him from the top of the spinet.

Colden attacked him with sword, at the open side, and shouted to his men:

“One of you get on the spinet. The other crawl under. We have him now.”

Still guarding himself from his enemy’s thrusts, Peyton heard one of the men leap from the music seat to the spinet, and the other advance creeping, doubtless with gun before him, under the instrument. Peyton sank to his knees, placed his shoulder under the back edge of the spinet’s projection, and, warding off a downward movement of Colden’s sword, turned the instrument over on its side, checking the creeping man under it, and throwing the other fellow to the floor some feet away. As the spinet fell, one of its legs, rising swiftly into the air, knocked Colden’s blade upward, and the Tory leaped back lest Peyton might avail himself of the opening. But the spinet-leg itself hindered Peyton from doing so. Colden rushed forward again, thrusting as he did so. Peyton leaped aside, made a swift half-turn, and landed a stroke on Colden’s sword-hand, making 275 the Tory cry out and drop the sword. Harry put his foot on it and cried:

“You’re at my mercy! Beg quarter!”

But the man who had been thrown from the top of the spinet now returned to the attack, coming around that end of the upset instrument which was opposite the end where Colden had menaced Harry. Seeing this new adversary, Harry retreated past Colden, in order to put himself in position. The soldier hastened after him, with upraised musket. At this moment, Peyton saw himself confronted by Elizabeth, who pulled open the door of the south hall. He stopped short to avoid running against her.

“Save yourself!” she cried, and pushed him through the open doorway, flinging the door shut upon him, a movement which the pursuing soldier, stayed for a moment by collision with Colden, was not in time to prevent. Harry heard the key move in the lock, and knew that Elizabeth had turned it, and that he was safe in the south hall, with a minute of vantage which he might employ as he would.

Elizabeth withdrew the key from the locked door, just as the pursuing soldier arrived at that door. The man, in his excitement, violently tried to open the door. Colden, who was wrapping a handkerchief around his wounded hand, shouted to the man:

“You fool, she has the key! Take it from her!”

“You shall kill me first!” she cried, and ran from the man towards the open window, stepping over the prostrate bodies of Sam and Williams as she went.

“After her! She’ll throw it into the snow!” cried Colden.

This much Harry heard through the door, and heard also the heavy tread of the soldier’s feet in pursuit of the girl. His mind imaged forth a momentary picture of the fellow’s rough hands laid on the delicate arms of Elizabeth, of her body clasped by the man in a struggle, her white skin reddened by his grasp. The spectacle, imaginary and lasting but an instant, maddened Peyton beyond endurance, made him a giant, a Hercules. He threw himself against the door repeatedly, plied foot and body in heavy blows. Meanwhile Elizabeth had reached the window, and thrown the key far out on the snow-heaped lawn. She had no sooner done so than the man laid his clutch on her arm.

“Fly, Peyton, for God’s sake! For my sake!” she shouted.

“You shall pay for aiding the enemy, if he does!” cried Colden. “Don’t let her escape, Thompson!”

At that instant the locked door gave way, and in burst Harry, having broken, to save Elizabeth from a rude contact, the barrier she had closed to save his life. That life, which he had once saved by callously assailing her heart, he now risked, that her body 277 might not suffer the touch of an ungentle hand. So swift and sudden was his entrance, that he had crossed the room, and floored Elizabeth’s captor, with a deep gash down the side of the head, ere Colden made a step towards him.

The man who had been under the fallen spinet had now extricated himself, and regained his feet, and he and Colden rushed on Peyton at once. Elated by having so speedily wrought Elizabeth’s release, and reduced the number of his able adversaries to two, Peyton bethought himself of a new plan. He fled through the deep doorway to the east hall, and took position on the staircase. He turned just in time to parry Colden’s sword, which the major had picked up and made shift to hold in his wrapped-up, wounded hand. Harry saw that an opportune stroke might send the sword from his enemy’s numb and weakening grasp, and his heart swelled with anticipated triumph, until he heard Colden’s hoarse cry:

“Shoot him, James, while I keep him occupied!”

This order was now the more practicable from Harry’s being on the stairs, above Colden, a great part of his body exposed to an aim that could not endanger his antagonist. Breathing heavily, his eyes afire with hatred, Colden repeated his attacks, while Harry saw the other’s musket raised, the barrel looking him in the eyes. He leaped a step higher, swung 278 his broken sword against the pendent chandelier, knocked the only burning candle from its socket, and threw the hall into darkness. A moment later the gun went off, giving an instant’s red flame, a loud crack, and a smell of gunpowder smoke. Harry heard a swift singing near his right ear, and knew that he was untouched.

Lest Colden’s sword, thrust at random, might find him in the dark, Harry instantly bestrode the stair-rail, and dropped, outside the balustrade, to the floor of the hall. He grasped his half-sword in both hands, so as to put his whole weight behind it, and made a lunge in the direction of a muttered curse. The curse gave way to a roar of pain and rage, and Colden’s second follower dropped, spurting blood in the darkness, his shoulder gashed horribly by the blunt end of Peyton’s imperfect weapon. Harry now ran back to the parlor, to deal with Colden in the light, the latter’s greater length of weapon giving a greater searching-power in the darkness. In the parlor Elizabeth stood waiting in suspense. Sam was sitting on the floor and staring stupidly at Williams, who was now awake and rubbing his head, and the Tory first fallen was still senseless. Harry had no sooner taken this scene in at a glance, than Colden was upon him.

The major’s eyes seemed to stand out like blazing carbuncles from the face of some deity of rage.

“G—d d—n your soul!” he screamed, and thrust. The point went straight, and Elizabeth, seeing it protrude through the back of Harry’s coat, near the left side of his body, uttered a low cry, and sank half-fainting to her knees. Colden shouted with triumphant laughter. “Die, you dog! And when you burn in hell, remember I sent you there!”

But the evil joy suddenly faded out of Colden’s face, for Harry Peyton, smiling, took a forward step, grasped near the hilt the sword that seemed to be sheathed in his own body, forced it from Colden’s hand, and then drew it slowly from its lodgment. No blood discolored it, and none oozed from Harry’s body.

The Virginian’s quick movement to escape the thrust had left only a part of his loose-fitting coat exposed, and Colden’s sword had passed through it, leaving him unhurt. Colden’s momentary appearance of victory had been the means of actual defeat.

The Tory major saw his cup of revenge dashed from his lips, saw himself deprived of sword and sweetheart, neither chance left of living nor motive left for life. His rage collapsed; his hate burst like a bubble.

“Kill me,” he said, quietly, to Peyton.

His look, innocent of any thought to draw compassion, quite disarmed Harry, who stood for a moment 280 with moistening eyes and a kind of welling-up at the throat, then said, in a rather unsteady voice:

“No, sir! God knows I’ve taken enough from you,” and he looked at Elizabeth, who had risen and was standing near him. Softened by the triumphant outcome for her love, she, too, was suddenly sensible of the defeated man’s unhappiness, and her eyes applauded and thanked Harry.

“You’ve taken what I never had,” said Colden, with a chastened kind of bitterness, “yet without which the life you give me back is worthless.”

“Make it worth something with this,” and Peyton held Colden’s sword out to him.

“What! You will trust me with it?” said Colden, amazed and incredulous, taking the sword, but holding it limply.

“Certainly, sir!”

Colden was motionless a moment, then placed his arm high against the doorway, and buried his face against his arm, to hide the outlet of what various emotions were set loose by his enemy’s display of pity and trust.

Harry gently drew Elizabeth to him and kissed her. Yielding, she placed her arms around his neck, and held him for a moment in an embrace of her own offering. Then she withdrew from his clasp, and when Colden again faced them she had resumed that invisible veil which no man, not even 281 the beloved, might pass through till she bade him.

“You will find me worthy of your trust, sir,” said Colden, brokenly, yet with a mixture of manly humility and honorable pride.[10]

“I am so sure of that,” said Harry, “that I confide to your care for a time what is dearest to me in the world. I ask you to accompany Miss Philipse to her home in New York, when it may suit her convenience, and to see that she suffer nothing for what has occurred here this night.”

“You are a generous enemy, sir,” said Colden, his eyes moistening again. “One man in ten thousand would have done me the honor, the kindness, of that request!”

“Why,” said Harry, taking his enemy’s hand, as if in token of farewell, “whatever be the ways of the knaves, respectable and otherwise, who are so cautious against tricks like their own, thank God it’s not so rotten a world that a gentleman may not trust a gentleman, when he is sure he has found one!”

Turning to Elizabeth, he said: “I beg you will leave this house at dawn, if you can. Williams and Sam, there, will be little the worse for their knocks, and can look after the fellows on the floor.”

“And you,” she replied, “must go at once. You must not further risk your life by a moment’s waiting. 282 Cuff shall saddle Cato for you. I sha’n’t rest till I feel that you are far on your way.”

He approached as if again to kiss her, but she held out her hand to stay him. He took the hand, bent over it, pressed it to his lips.

“But,—” he said, in a tone as low as a whisper, “when—”

“When the war is over,” she answered, softly, “let Cato bring you back.”