“What does he say?” called out the man from the tavern.  “What does he say, Francy McCraw?”

“He says it maun be Mohawk smoke, Danny Redstock.”

“And what if it is?” blustered Redstock, shouldering his way to McCraw, rifle in hand.  “Keep your black looks for your neighbors, Andrew Bowman.  What have we to do with your Mohawk fires?”

“Herman Salisbury!” cried Bowman to a neighbor, “do you hear what this Tory renegade says?”

“Quiet!  Quiet, there,” said Redstock, swaggering out into the road.  “Francy McCraw, our good neighbors are woful perplexed by that thread o’ birch smoke yonder.”

“Then tell the feckless fools tae watch it!” screamed McCraw, seizing his rifle and menacing the little throng of men and women who had closed swiftly in on him.  “Hands off me, Johnny Putnam—­back, for your life, Charley Cady!  Ay, stare at the smoke till ye’re eyes drop frae th’ sockets!  But no; there’s some foulk ‘ill tak’ nae warnin’!”

He backed off down the road, followed by Redstock, rifles cocked.

“An’ ye’ll bear me out,” he shouted, “that there’s them wha’ hear these words now shall meet their weirds ere a hunter’s moon is wasted!”

He laughed his insane laugh and, throwing his rifle over his shoulder, halted, facing us.

“Hae ye no heard o’ Catrine Montour?” he jeered.  “She’ll come in the night, Andrew Bowman!  Losh, mon, but she’s a grewsome carlin’, wi’ the witch-locks hangin’ to her neck an’ her twa een blazin’!”

“You drive us out to-night!” shouted Redstock.  “We’ll remember it when Brant is in the hills!”

“The wolf-yelp!  Clan o’ the wolf!” screamed McCraw.  “Woe!  Woe to Broadalbane!  ‘Tis the pibroch o’ Glencoe shall wake ye to the woods afire!  Be warned!  Be warned, for ye stand knee-deep in ye’re shrouds!”

In the ruddy dusk their dark forms turned to shadows and were gone.

Van Horn stirred in his saddle, then shook his shoulders as though freeing them from a weight.

“Now you have it, you Broadalbin men,” he said, grimly.  “Go to the forts while there’s time.”

In the darkness around us children began to whimper; a woman broke down, sobbing.

“Silence!” cried Bowman, sternly.  And to Dorothy, who sat quietly on her horse beside him, “Say to the patroon that we know our enemies.  And you, Peter Van Horn, on whichever side you stand, we men of the Bush thank you and this young lady for your coming.”

And that was all.  In silence we wheeled our horses northward, Van Horn riding ahead, and passed out of that dim hamlet which lay already in the shadows of an unknown terror.

Behind us, as we looked back, one or two candles flickered in cabin windows, pitiful, dim lights in the vast, dark ocean of the forest.  Above us the stars grew clearer.  A vesper-sparrow sang its pensive song.  Tranquil, sweet, the serene notes floated into silver echoes never-ending, till it seemed as if the starlight all around us quivered into song.