“And if we get there,” exclaimed Dick, eagerly, “we can crash in on the flank of Early.”

“I’m not a soldier,” she said, “but that plan was in my mind.  A large division could be hidden in the heavy timber along Cedar Creek, and then, if the proper secrecy were observed, reach the Confederate flank tomorrow night, unseen.”

“And that’s on the other side of the valley,” said Dick.

“But at this point it’s only four or five miles across.”

“I wasn’t making difficulties, I was merely locating the places as you tell them.”

“I’ve drawn a map of the Confederate position.  It’s in pencil, but it ought to help.”

“It will be beyond price!” exclaimed Dick.  “You will give it to me?”

“Of course!  But you must wait a minute!  Until I heard my brother’s whistle I didn’t know whether it was North or South that I was going to meet on the mountain.”

She disappeared in the bushes, and Dick heard a light rustling, but in a few moments she returned and held out a broad sheet of heavy paper, upon which a map had been drawn with care and skill.  He had divined already its great value, and now his opinion was confirmed.

“I can’t thank you,” he said, as he took it, “but General Sheridan and General Grant can.  And I’ve no doubt they’ll do it when the time comes.”

Again the light flush appeared in her cheeks and she looked actually handsome.

“Since my present task is finished,” she said, “I’d better go.”

“Where did you leave your horse?” asked Shepard.

“He’s tethered in the bushes about a hundred yards farther down the side of the mountain.  I’ll mount and ride back in the direction of Richmond.  I know all the roads.”

Sergeant Whitley, who had gone a little higher up and who was watching while they talked, whistled softly.  Yet the whistle, low as it was, was undoubtedly a signal of alarm.

“Go at once, Henrietta,” whispered Shepard, urgently.  “It’s important that you shouldn’t be held here, that you be left with a free hand.”

“It’s so,” she said.

He stooped and kissed her on the brow, and, without another word, she vanished among the cedars on the lower slope.  Dick thought he heard a moment later the distant beat of hoofs and he felt sure she was riding fast and far.  Then he turned his attention to the danger confronting them, because a danger it certainly was, and that, too, of the most formidable kind.  But, first, he gave the map to Shepard to carry.

Sergeant Whitley came down the slope and joined them.

“I think we’d better lie down, all of us,” he said.

Now the real leadership passed to the sergeant, scout, trailer and skilled Indian fighter.  It passed to him, because all of them knew that the conditions made him most fit for the place.  They knelt or lay but held their weapons ready.  The sergeant knelt by Dick’s side and the youth saw that he was tense and expectant.