Chapter 31 - Page 2

assurance; nor would you have again
reduced me to this distressing alternative."

"What alternative?" asked Frances, pitying his emotions deeply, but
eagerly seizing upon every circumstance to prolong the interview.

"What alternative! Am I not compelled to spend this night in the saddle
to recapture your brother, when I had thought to lay my head on its
pillow, with the happy consciousness of having contributed to his
release? You make me seem your enemy; I, who would cheerfully shed the
last drop of blood in your service. I repeat, Frances, it was rash; it
was unkind; it was a sad, sad mistake."

She bent towards him and timidly took one of his hands, while with the
other she gently removed the curls from his burning brow.

"Why go at all, dear Peyton?" she asked. "You have done much for your
country, and she cannot exact such a sacrifice as this at your hand."

"Frances! Miss Wharton!" exclaimed the youth, springing on his feet, and
pacing the floor with a cheek that burned through its brown covering,
and an eye that sparkled with wounded integrity. "It is not my country,
but my honor, that requires the sacrifice. Has he not fled from a guard
of my own corps? But for this, I might have been spared the blow! But if
the eyes of the Virginians are blinded to deception and artifice, their
horses are swift of foot, and their sabers keen. We shall see, before
to-morrow's sun, who will presume to hint that the beauty of the sister
furnished a mask to conceal the brother! Yes, yes, I should like, even
now," he continued, laughing bitterly, "to hear the villain who would
dare to surmise that such treachery existed!"

"Peyton, dear Peyton," said Frances, recoiling from his angry eye, "you
curdle my blood--would you kill my brother?"

"Would I not die for him!" exclaimed Dunwoodie, as he turned to her more
mildly. "You know I would; but I am distracted with the cruel surmise to
which this step of Henry's subjects me. What will Washington think of
me, should he learn that I ever became your husband?"

"If that alone impels you to act so harshly towards my brother,"
returned Frances, with a slight tremor in her voice, "let it never
happen for him to learn."

"And this is consolation, Frances!"

"Nay, dear Dunwoodie, I meant nothing harsh or unkind; but are you not
making us both of more consequence with Washington than the truth
will justify?"

"I trust that my name is not entirely unknown to the commander in
chief," said the major, a little proudly; "nor are you as obscure as
your modesty would make you. I