He dropped the rein instantly. Then he raised to her a face calm
and colorless, but for a red line extending from his eyebrow to his
chin, and said quietly,--

"I had no desire to detain you. I only wished to say that when you
see Gen. Washington I know you will be just enough to tell him that
Major Van Zandt knew nothing of your wrongs, or even your presence
here, until you presented them, and that since then he has treated
you as became an officer and a gentleman."

Yet even as he spoke she was gone. At the moment that her
fluttering skirt swept in a furious gallop down the hillside, the
major turned, and re-entered the house. The few lounging troopers
who were witnesses of the scene prudently turned their eyes from
the white face and blazing eyes of their officer as he strode by
them. Nevertheless, when the door closed behind him, contemporary
criticism broke out:--

"'Tis a Tory jade, vexed that she cannot befool the major as she
has the captain," muttered Sergeant Tibbitts.

"And going to try her tricks on the general," added Private Hicks.

Howbeit both these critics may have been wrong. For as Mistress
Thankful thundered down the Morristown road she thought of many
things. She thought of her sweetheart Allan, a prisoner, and
pining for HER help and HER solicitude; and yet--how dared he--if
he HAD really betrayed or misjudged her! And then she thought
bitterly of the count and the baron, and burned to face the latter,
and in some vague way charge the stolen kiss upon him as the cause