rom Staunton with a barrel of so'gum whisky, and--and--"

"You drank too much and was caught where you had no business to be.
However," Dick added, sternly, "the regiment marches in the morning--you
must get out of here. Soldier, show me to Captain Payne's quarters. Say
to him that Major Braine, of Rickett's Legion, desires to speak with him
a moment." But he had no sooner said this than he realized the danger he
was running.

The captain might know Braine, and then how could he extricate himself
from the dilemma? Luckily the captain was not in his quarters, and Dick,
with calm effrontery, sat down and wrote out a statement of the case,
where he was to be found, and his reasons for carrying the
prisoner away.

The sergeant, having read this, made no objection to releasing the
alleged deserter, since there had been no orders concerning him, and,
without more ado, Jack walked away with his captain, the picture of
abashed valor and repentant tipsiness.

"Now, Dick, there's no time to ask the meaning of your miraculous
doings. We've still time to let our friends out and get away before
daylight; but we mustn't lose a second. Sh! stand still, what's that?
Troopers! Good heavens, they can't have found out your trick so soon!
Ah, no! They are floundering about looking for quarters," he added, in
immeasurable relief, as the voices of the riders sounded through the
darkness, cursing luck, the road, and everything else. "O Dick, if we
only had the countersign I could play a brilliant trick on these
greenhorns! Perhaps I can as it is."

"I have the countersign. How do you suppose I could have managed to get
to you if I hadn't? It is 'Lafayette.'"

"Glory! Now make all the clatter you can after I challenge."

They had by this time reached a row of tumble-down stables directly in
the rear of the prison, and shut out from the open ground by a decrepit
fence, broken here and there by negroes too lazy to pass out into the
street to reach the river. The horsemen had turned into this lane-like
highway--evidently misdirected. When within a few feet, Jack gave a
sudden whack on the board and cried, sternly:

"Halt! Who comes there?"

There was a sudden clash of steel as the group halted in a heap, and
then a weary voice replied:

"We have no countersign. We should have been at our destination long
before sundown, but were misdirected ten miles out of our course on the
Manchester pike."

"Very well. Dismount and come forward o