he
farmer's heifers. Here was an opportunity to mislead his pursuer, and
the boy dropped to the ground by the side of a log and lay perfectly
quiet. Pierre, out of breath, and struggling to make up the ground he
had lost, kept on after the heifer, thinking it was Noel. As he leaped
over the log, he was so near the prostrate figure that his foot actually
touched the boy's jacket.

As soon as the Canadian was out of hearing, Noel jumped up and started
toward the clearing, which he knew was near by. There was no time to
lose, for Pierre must soon find out his mistake and return. In a few
minutes Noel reached the edge of the wood, and far off across the fields
saw a black shaft in the starlight, the spire of the village church. It
was fully three miles away; for he had been running from the village,
rather than toward it. The attack, he knew, would be made within an
hour.

There was a stretch of nearly a mile across the fields before a road
could be reached. Noel, tired from his dash through the woods, started
forward across the uneven pasture-land. In spite of his anxiety, he
laughed to himself at the thought of Pierre's feelings when he should
discover that he was chasing only a frightened cow.

As he hurried on as fast as his tired legs would carry him, it seemed to
his strained senses that an unnatural and forbidding hush pervaded the
warm night. Even the notes of whippoorwills that came from the bushes
near the forest sounded less loud than usual, and seemed to foretell a
calamity. The hares and other animals that come out in the darkness had
hidden themselves.

Finally he came to the road that led on to the village, still two miles
away. There was little danger of being overtaken by Pierre; but there
was a chance of his being seen by the sentinels that the raiders might
station on the roads leading to the village. He could not go faster than
a slow trot now, and he was panting painfully. His moccasin-clad feet
ploughed through the dust, striking against the stones in the rough
road. He thought, a little bitterly, that the other boys were right if
they believed that he was not really able-bodied; the accident that had
hurt his arm had weakened him in every way. However, he plodded on
steadily, resolved that determination should take the place, as far as
possible, of bodily strength.

He had gone perhaps half the way when there was the sound of a horse's
hoofs coming from the direction of the village. He crouched