-plays being, in those days,
good enough to be much read in book form,--and brought out from town
by Elizabeth. The dinner was, as to the attitude of the participants
towards one another, a repetition of the breakfast. In the afternoon,
Peyton having expressed an intention of venturing outdoors for a
little air, Elizabeth assigned Sam to attend him, and said that, as
he had to traverse the south hall and stairs in going to his room, he
might thereafter put to his own service the unused south door in
leaving and entering the house. Harry strolled for a few minutes on
the terrace, but his lameness made walking little pleasure, and he
returned to the east parlor, where Elizabeth sat reading while her
aunt was looking drowsily at the fire. Peyton took a chair at the
right side of the fireplace, and mentally contrasted his present
security with his peril in that place on a former occasion.

The trampling of horses at a distance elicited from Elizabeth the
words, "The Hessian patrol, on the Albany road, as usual, I suppose."
But, the clatter increasing, she arose and looked through the narrow
slit whereby light was admitted between the almost closed shutters.
After a moment she said, in unconcealed alarm:

"Oh, heaven! 'Tis a party of Lord Cathcart's officers! They said at
King's Bridge they'd come one day to pay their respects. How can I
keep them out?"

Peyton arose, but remained by the fireplace, and said, "To keep them
out, if they think themselves expected, would excite suspicion. I will
go to my room."

Elizabeth, meanwhile, had opened the window to draw the shutter
close; but her trembling movement, assisted by a passing breeze, and
by the perversity of inanimate things, caused the shutter to fly wide
open.

She turned towards Peyton, with signs of fright on her face. "Back!"
she whispered. "They'll see you through the window. Into the
closet,--the closet!" She motioned imperatively towards the pair of
doors immediately beside him, west of the fireplace. Hearing the
horses' footfalls near at hand, and perceiving, with her, that he
would not have time to walk safely across the parlor to the hall, he
opened one of the doors indicated by her, and stepped into the
closet.

In the instant before he closed the door after him, he noticed the
stairs descending backward from the right side of the closet. He
foresaw that the British officers would come into the parlor. If they
should make a long stay, he might have to c