u call a
secret agent. There is much money behind me, big politics, big
commercial interests. I love the big games, and my game and my task--my
duty to my masters, has been to split this country along a clean line
from east to west, from ocean to ocean--to make two countries of it! You
will see that happen, my friend."

"No one will ever see it happen," I said to him, soberly.

"Under which flag, then, for you?" he asked quickly.

"The flag you saw on the frontier, Orme," I answered him. "That is the
flag of America, and will be. The frontier is free. It will make America
free forever."

"Oh, well," he said, "the argument will be obvious enough by next
spring--in April, I should guess. And whatever you or I may think, the
game will be big, very big--the biggest until you have your real war
between black and white, and your yet bigger one between yellow and
white. I imagine old England will be in that with you, or with one of
you, if you make two countries here. But I may be a wandering Jew on
some other planet before that time."

He sat for a time, his chin dropped on his breast. Finally he reached me
his hand.

"Let me go," he said. "I promise you to leave."

"To leave the State?"

"No, I will not promise that."

"To leave the County?"

"Yes, unless war should bring me here in the course of my duty. But I
will promise to leave this town, this residence--this girl--in short, I
must do that. And you are such an ass that I was going to ask you to
promise to keep your promise--up there." He motioned toward the window
where the light lately had been.

"You do not ask that now?" I queried.

"You are a fighting man," he said, suddenly. "Let all these questions
answer themselves when their time comes. After all, I suppose a woman is
a woman in the greatest of the Barnes, and one takes one's chances.
Suppose we leave the debt unsettled until we meet some time? You know,
you may be claiming debt of me."

"Will you be ready?" I asked him.

"Always. You know that. Now, may I go? Is my parole ended?"

"It ends at the gate," I said to him, and handed him his pistol. The
knife I retained, forgetfully; but when I turned to offer it to him he
was gone.

CHAPTER XL

A CONFUSION IN COVENANTS

During the next morning Harry Sheraton galloped down to the village
after the morning's mail. On his return he handed me two letters. One
was from Captain Matthew Stevenson, dated at Fort Henry, and informed me
that