nto the side entry, sniffed along the crack above the
threshold. Apparently satisfied, he barked softly, and rising on his
hind legs lifted the latch and sprang into the entry. Abram followed
with Basha. As he lifted the latch of the outer door--the string had
been drawn in early, as was the custom in those troublous time--and
swung it back, the light from the fire fell upon the figure of a man
lying across the doorstone.

"Sakes alive!" exclaimed Abram, drawing back. But at a word from the
mistress, they lifted the man and brought him in and laid him down on
the braided woollen mat before the fire. Then for a moment there was
silence, for he wore the dress of a British soldier, and his right arm
was bandaged. He had fainted from loss of blood, apparently--perhaps
from hunger. Basha loosened his coat at the throat, and tried to force
a drop or two of "spirits" into his mouth, while Mrs. Heath rubbed his
hands.

"He ain't dead," said Basha, in a grim tone, "and mind you, we'll
see trouble from this." Basha was an arrant rebel, and hated the
very sight of a red coat. "What are you doing here," she continued,
addressing him, "killin' honest folks, when you'd better 've staid
cross seas in yer own country?"

"Basha!" said Mrs. Heath reprovingly, "he is helpless."

But Basha as she unwound the tight bandage from the shattered arm,
kept muttering to herself like a rising tempest, until at length the
man having come quite to himself, detected her feeling, and with great
effort said, "I am _not_ a British soldier."

"Then what to goodness have you got on their uniform for?" queried
Basha.

Little by little the pitiful story was told. He was an American
soldier who had been doing duty as a spy in the British camp. Up to
the very last day of his stay he had not been suspected; but trying to
get away he was suspected, challenged, and fired at. The shot passed
through his arm. He was certain his pursuers had followed him till
night, and they would be likely to continue the search the next day,
and he begged Mrs. Heath to secrete him for a day or two, if possible.

"I wouldn't mind being shot, marm," he said, "but you know they'll
hang me if they get me. Of course I risked it when I went into their
camp, but it's none the pleasanter for all that."

Now in the old Heath house there was a secret chamber, built in the
side of the chimney. Most of those old colonial houses had enormous
chimneys, that took up, sometimes, a quar