Ezra smiled and nodded. At this Gilbert Scarlett laughed and slapped him upon the back.
“I might have known it,” said he. “You are a deep one for a lad.”
“Only a few nights ago you had a rather poor opinion of my wit,” said Ezra.
“I remember the saying and I recall it,” spoke Scarlett. “I took you for a country lad, in sympathy with the colonists; and I thought it quite a jest to have you carry a message which I felt sure was calculated to help your countrymen but little. But,” with a gesture, “I have changed my mind with regard to you. I no longer know what to think. But this I do know,” with great candor, “I like you; and I’ll stand your friend, if you need a friend, at any place and at any time.”
Before the boy had an opportunity to express his thanks, Pennington emerged from the kitchen. Buttoning up his coat, he said:
“You’ll have to leave your horses in care of the landlord, gentlemen. The patrols and detachments that hold the roads would be sure to see us if we went mounted.”
“Without a horse,” declared he, “I am like a fish without water to swim in. But, if we must, we must, and that’s all there is to it.”
Without, it was dark and silent. The bronze sky of the early evening had given place to one entirely black. But the stars winked curiously down, and their rays relieved the darkness to a great extent.
“It will behoove us to mind our steps,” said Pennington, as they made their way along the road by which Ezra had approached the “Indian’s Head.” “Daylight shows many ditches and sunken fences in this hollow, and it would scarcely benefit our peace of mind or body to come upon one or the other.”
“’Twas a good thought to create the stars,” mused the soldier of fortune, aloud, after they had gone some distance. “They relieve the moon of duty when she is weary. If it were not for them and their twinkling, the night would be as black as my hat.”
“Queer things are done on dark nights,” said the spy, and he laughed in his disagreeable way.
Scarlett nudged Ezra in the darkness. Then he made reply:
“I can well believe that. And the saying brings to mind a little experience that I once had in Moscow while I served my short career with the Czar. My regiment had but returned from the frontier, after several onfalls at Tartar towns; and I and several of my comrades were drinking our glasses of tea in a booth. It was a very dark night and we talked over the times just passed, and were hoping good fortune for those to come, when there entered a ——”