As they ascended, the wind increased in strength, but being on their backs now it seemed to help them along.  They were soon high up on the slopes and then they naturally turned for a parting look at Hubbard in its valley, a twin to that of Townsville.  It looked from afar neat and given up to peace, but Dick knew that it had been stirred deeply by the visit of his comrades and himself.

“It seems,” he said, “that the war would pass by these little mountain nests.”

“But it don’t,” said Red Blaze.  “War, I guess, is like a mad an’ kickin’ mule, hoofs lashin’ out everywhar, an’ you can’t tell what they’re goin’ to hit.  Boys, we’re makin’ good time.  That wind on our backs fairly lifts us up the mountain side.”

Petty had all the easy familiarity of the backwoods.  He treated the boy and man who rode with him as comrades of at least a year’s standing, and they felt in return that he was one of them, a man to be trusted.  They retained all the buoyancy which the receipt of the dispatch had given them, and Dick, his heart beating high, scarcely felt the wind and cold.

“In another quarter of an hour we’ll be at the top,” said Petty.  Then he added after a moment’s pause:  “If I’m not mistook, we’ll have company.  See that path, leadin’ out of the west, an’ runnin’ along the slope.  It comes into the main road, two or three hundred yards further on, an’ I think I can see the top of a horseman’s head ridin’ in it.  What do you say, sergeant?”

“I say that you are right, Red Blaze.  I plainly see the head of a big man, wearing a fur cap, an’ there are others behind him, ridin’ in single file.  What’s your opinion, Mr. Mason?”

“The same as yours and Red Blaze’s.  I, too, can see the big man with the fur cap on his head and at least a dozen following behind.  Do you think it likely, Red Blaze, that they’ll reach the main road before we pass the mouth of the path?”

A sudden thought had leaped up in Dick’s mind and it set his pulses to beating hard.  He remembered some earlier words of Red Blaze’s.

“We’ll go by before they reach the main road,” replied Red Blaze, “unless they make their hosses travel a lot faster than they’re travelin’ now.”

“Then suppose we whip up a little,” said Dick.

Both Red Blaze and the sergeant gave him searching glances.

“Do you mean—­” began Whitley.

“Yes, I mean it.  I know it.  The man in front wearing the fur cap is Bill Skelly.  He and his men made an attack upon the home of my uncle, Colonel Kenton, who is a Southern leader in Kentucky.  He and his band were Northerners there, but they will be Southerners here, if it suits their purpose.”

“An’ it will shorely suit their purpose to be Southerners now,” said Red Blaze.  “We three are ridin’ mighty good hoss flesh.  Me an’ the sergeant have good rifles an’ pistols, you have good pistols, an’ we all have good, big overcoats.  This is a lonely mountain side with war flyin’ all about us.  Easy’s the place an’ easy’s the deed.  That is if we’d let ’em, which we ain’t goin’ to do.”