“Well, we’ve got to find ’em. They tell me deserters from Sullivan’s camp are going through here fifty a day. That’s your task. Round up deserters and put ’em to work. Here!” He reached for his pen and scribbled on a sheet of paper: then tossed it to me. It read:

Capt. Peter Merrill has authority to employ unattached soldiers on fortifications. This is for the good of the Colonies, and Capt. Merrill is authorized to use all necessary force.       B. Arnold, Brig. Gen.

“There you are,” Arnold said. “Orders and commission, too. You’re an army captain now, as well as a sea-captain. I’ve got no right to appoint officers. Only Congress can do that; but if I need officers, I don’t know how to get ’em unless I appoint ’em. Go ahead, now! Get men; and if they won’t work, beat ’em! I don’t propose to have my soldiers sacrificed because a lot of damned renegades refuse to take orders. You can work with Cap Huff. He—–”

Outside the window Arnold’s black horse, tied to one of the posts beside the entrance, whinnied shrilly. Far off we heard the clatter of hoofs. Arnold went to the window. “Ho!” he said. “Here’s a friend of yours with something on his mind.”

The sound of hoofs grew noisy and came to a scurrying stop. Arnold threw up the window. “Send him in here,” he shouted. “Come in here!”

It was Joseph Marie Verrieul, one-time student of the Revrint Dr. Wheelock at Dartmouth, who opened the door. He smiled at Arnold confidingly. “They told me you might be here, or maybe at Sorel or Nicolet,” he said. “I’m glad you’re here, because I’m near beat out.”

“What’s your news?”

“It’s the British,” Verrieul said, almost happily. “It was difficult to find out about them because of the cloud of Indians around them, most of them drunk. Oh, very drunk! It’s a good thing for unworthy Joseph Verrieul that he learned at Dartmouth how to hold a quantity of liquor.”

“I’ll take your word for that,” Arnold said. “What about the British?”

“Yes,” Verrieul said, “the British. I thought it best to wait until I learned definitely about them. Now I know. They have just arrived at Three Rivers. They’re starting up stream at once, a great fleet. Sixty vessels.”

“How many men?” Arnold asked. “How much of an army?”

“How much of an army?” Verrieul repeated. His eyes wandered. “There was never anything so fine: nothing they haven’t got! A hundred and twenty-five thousand gallons of rum! Plenty for everybody. Cannons and muskets, everything polished, so the sun glitters on them, and the red coats.” As an afterthought he mumbled, “Silver facings on the Germans. Blue with silver lace and facings, all shining.”

Arnold slapped his table sharply. “How many men?”