Nason stared out over the broad Hudson, and the little sandy islands that swam on it pinkly in the light of the setting sun. He seemed to think aloud, disconnected thoughts: “I got you into this—I know Marie: she’s all you say she is—anybody that’s caught in her schemes deserves to be helped, I guess—I was caught once, myself: when we marched to Quebec I was called a spy and a traitor, and put out of the army. I wouldn’t have known what to do if my friends hadn’t stood by me. I wouldn’t want to see anyone else called a traitor because of her, if so be he isn’t one.” As an afterthought, he added, “And it wouldn’t help me with Phoebe much.”

He nodded at me soberly. I drew a deep breath. Friends, I realized, were better than anything the world had to offer: without friends a man was helpless—worse off, almost, than in his grave.

“We’ll tell Arnold about Marie,” Nason went on, “but about Nathaniel Merrill we’ll say nothing. Understand? Nothing! If anybody asks you, tell him you saw Nathaniel fighting—and fighting well—at the Battle of Valcour Island. Say you saw him get hurt. That’s all you did see. For all we know, he’s dead. That’s all you got to tell ’em —the truth!”

Cap Huff heaved himself to his knees, so that his words had a flavor of piety. “That’s all I ever tell anybody—the truth; but I make it a rule not to tell nobody a mite more than he can stand!” He gestured so violently with his trout that its head came off.

“Look at that!” Doc Means said mildly. “You’ve wore out your fish! Now we got to catch another for Cap’n Peter’s supper.”

LXI

THE army to which Arnold returned was hungry, ragged, lousy and pocky, but it was nothing to what it became after Burgoyne’s Indians broke through.

We sent Natanis down river to watch, so that the rest of us could do the necessary things—bathe and shave, and trim each other’s hair; wash and air our blankets; clean our muskets and grease them; set new flints in the locks; sew up the rents in our clothes, and scrub the grime and sweat from our shirts and stockings. So, warned by Natanis, we were waiting outside Schuyler’s tent half an hour after Arnold’s arrival in camp, eagerly listening to the sharp tones of Arnold’s voice and Schuyler’s recurrent laughter. There was something about that voice of Arnold’s that worked on our spirits like rum and filled us with restless elation.