“Yes,” said Dick. “Be careful, boys, and don’t let them see you. Get slowly behind trees.”
They took up their stations as suggested, and after a few minutes Dick said: “I’m going to slip down there, get within hearing distance of those fellows, if I can, and learn what they are doing here.”
“Look out that they don’t see and capture you, Dick,” cautioned Tom.
“I’ll be careful,” was the reply. Then, telling the two to remain there, Dick set out on his perilous expedition.
He was careful to keep trees between himself and the redcoats, and as he was skilled at this kind of work, he managed to reach a point within hearing distance of the redcoats as they sat talking, then stationed behind a tree, Dick stood there, listening intently.
As it turned out, he was well repaid for the danger he had run in coming there, for he heard the British soldiers talking of how they were going to visit a settlement made up mostly of patriots, as soon as it was dark, plunder the homes of the settlers, and then burn the houses down.
It was a cold-blooded plan, and Dick shuddered as he listened, but at the same time he made up his mind to hasten to the settlement, warn the settlers, and thus enable them to either prepare to defend themselves, or take their leave before the redcoats put in an appearance.
Dick was on the point of slipping away, when he saw a couple of redcoats leave the group and come slowly toward the very tree behind which he was standing.
His blood suddenly seemed to congeal, for he realized that he was in great danger of discovery and capture.
About the time that Dick was standing behind the tree, with the two redcoats approaching, in a little log cabin that was used as a school building, at a point about a mile from a Tory settlement consisting of about thirty families, sat a rather good-looking young man of perhaps twenty-four years of age. He was to play a rather important part in the life of Dick Dare and must now be introduced to the reader.
Herbert Miller was his name, and he was the teacher of the school. As the children had gone home, he was sitting at his desk, reading.
As has been stated, the schoolhouse stood about a mile from a Tory settlement, and about two miles from the schoolhouse, in the other direction, was a patriot settlement, consisting of about a dozen families. The schoolhouse had been placed where it stood, for the convenience of the children from both settlements, but was closer to the Tory settlement because there were more of the Tories than of the patriots. Of late, however, since the coming into that region of Arnold, with his army of British and Tory soldiers, the Tories of the settlement had grown rather arrogant. This, being taken up by their children, resulted in lots of trouble at the school, the Tory children abusing the patriot children in spite of the efforts of the teacher to prevent it, and at the time of which we write only a few patriot children were attending the school. These few were the larger children, who could hold their own successfully against the arrogant and aggressive Tory children.