to escape. You
shoot me. Then I return to my own army, and report myself dead. That
ends your difficulty and saves me from a court-martial. They can't
court-martial a corpse."

The face of the sergeant flashed with relief and satisfaction. In his
anxiety to rid himself of his prisoner, he lifted the bicycle into the
road and held it in readiness.

"You're all right!" he said, heartily. "You can make your getaway as
quick as you like."

But to the conspiracy Miss Farrar refused to lend herself.

"How do you know," she demanded, "that he will keep his promise? He
may not go back to his own army. He can be just as dead on my lawn as
anywhere else!"

Lathrop shook his head at her sadly.

"How you wrong me!" he protested. "How dare you doubt the promise of a
dying man? These are really my last words, and I wish I could think of
something to say suited to the occasion, but the presence of strangers
prevents."

He mounted his bicycle. "'If I had a thousand lives to give,'" he
quoted with fervor, "'I'd give them all to--'" he hesitated, and smiled
mournfully on Miss Farrar. Seeing her flushed and indignant countenance,
he added, with haste, "to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts!"

As he started on his wheel slowly down the path, he turned to the
sergeant.

"I'm escaping," he explained. The Reds, with an enthusiasm undoubtedly
genuine, raised their rifles, and the calm of the Indian summer was
shattered by two sharp reports. Lathrop, looking back over his shoulder,
waved one hand reassuringly.

"Death was instantaneous," he called. He bent his body over the
handle-bar, and they watched him disappear rapidly around the turn in
the road.

Miss Farrar sighed with relief.

"Thank you very much," she said.

As though signifying that to oblige a woman he would shoot any number of
prisoners, the sergeant raised his hat.

"Don't mention it, lady," he said. "I seen he was annoying you, and
that's why I got rid of him. Some of them amateur soldiers, as soon as
they get into uniform, are too fresh. He took advantage of you because
your folks were away from home. But don't you worry about that. I'll
guard this house until your folks get back."

Miss Farrar protested warmly.

"Really!" she exclaimed; "I need no one to guard me."

But the soldier was obdurate. He motioned his comrade down the road.

"Watch at the turn," he ordered; "he may come back or send some of the
Blues to take us. I'll stay here and protect the