’Twould be a thankless task to take you with us stage by stage on our cross-country gallop to advertise General Greene of the victory at the cow pastures.  Suffice it to say that we made shift to turn the head of the advancing British main, now in motion and hastening with all speed to cut Dan Morgan off; that we were by turns well soaked by rain and stream, deep mired in bogs, chased times without number by the enemy’s outriders, and hardshipped freely for food and horse provender before we saw the camp on the Pedee.  All this you may figure for yourselves, the main point being that we came at length to the goal, weary, mire-splashed and belted to the last buckle-hole to pinch down the hunger pains, but sound of skin, wind and limb.

Having our news, which set the camp in a pretty furor of rejoicing, I promise you, General Greene lost not an hour in making his dispositions.  Leaving Isaac Huger and Colonel Otho Williams in command at Cheraw, the general sent Edward Stevens with the Virginians by way of Charlotte to Morgan’s aid, and himself took horse, with a handful of dragoons in which Dick and I were volunteers, to ride post haste to a meeting with Morgan at the upper fords.

Again I may pass lightly over an interval of three days spent hardily in the saddle, coming at once to that rain-drenched thirty-first of January, cold, raw and dismal, when we drew rein at Sherrard’s Ford and found Dan Morgan and his men safe across the Catawba with his prisoners, and my Lord Cornwallis quite as safely flood-checked on the western bank of the stream.

Having done our errand, Dick and I reported at once to our colonel.  ’Twas of a piece with William Washington’s goodness of heart to offer us leave to rest.

“You have had weary work of it, I doubt not, gentlemen,” he would say.  “Your time is your own until General Greene sets us in order for what he has in mind to do.”

I looked at Dick, and he looked at me.

“May we count upon twenty-four hours, think you, Colonel?” I asked.

“Safely, I should say.”

“Then I shall ask leave of absence for Captain Jennifer and myself till this time to-morrow,” I went on.  “This is our home neighborhood, as you know, and we have a little matter of private business which may be despatched in a day.”

“Will this business take you without the lines?”

“That is as it may be, sir.  I do not know the bounds of the outposting.”

The colonel wrote us passes to come and go at will past the sentries, and I drew Dick away.

“What is it, Jack?” he asked, when we were by ourselves.

“’Tis the fulfilling of my promise to you, Richard.  Get your horse and we will ride together.”

“But whither?” he queried.

“To Appleby Hundred—­and Mistress Margery.”

XLVIII

HOW WE KEPT TRYST AT APPLEBY HUNDRED