g in my ears, I heard the meaning phrase he
used at parting. Challenged? Not quite, but threatened with a
challenge. The cards were mine to play--a pretty hand, with here and
there a trump. Could I meet him and serve my country best? Aye, if I
killed him. And, strangely, I never thought that he might kill me; I
only weighed the chances. If I killed him he could not blab and danger
me with hints of meddling or of rank disloyalty; but if I only maimed
him he would never rest until suspicious eyes must make my mission
useless. Suddenly I was aware that I had been a fool to anger him, if I
wished to stay here in New York; nay, it was patent that unless I
killed him he must one day work a mischief to our cause through me. A
sneaking and unworthy happiness crept slowly over me, knowing that once
my mission terminated here I was free to hoist true colors, free to
bear arms, free to maintain openly the cause I had labored for so long
in secret. No more mole's work a-burrowing into darkness for a scrap to
stay my starving country's maw; no more slinking, listening, playing
the stupid indifferent!

And all the while my conscience was at work, urging me to repair the
damage my forgetful passion had wrought, urging me to heal the breach
with Butler, using what skill I might command, so that I could stay
here where his Excellency had set me, plying my abhorred trade in
useful, unendurable obscurity.

It was a battle now 'twixt pride and conscience, 'twixt fierce desire
and a loathed duty--doubly detested since I had spied a way to freedom
and had half tasted a whiff of good free air, untainted by deception.

"O Lord!" I groaned within myself, "will no one set me free of this pit
of intrigue and corruption in which I'm doomed to lurk? Must I, in
loyalty to his Excellency, repair this fault--go patch up all with
Butler, and deceive him so that his hawk's eyes and forked tongue may
not set folk a-watching this house sidewise?"

But while Dennis's irons were in my hair I thought: "Nevertheless, I
must send a belt to our allies, the Oneidas; and then I dare not stay!
Oh, joy!"

But the joy was soon dashed. My belt must go first to Colonel Willett,
and then to his Excellency, and it might be that he would judge it best
to let the Oneidas fight their own battles and so decline to send my
belt.

By the time I had arrived so far in my mental argument Dennis had
curled, powdered, and tied my hair in the most fashionable manner,
using