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 glance fell upon the stagecoach and she heard the driver exclaim to the group of travelers gathered around one of the off horses.

"Gentlemen, this is a sick horse. We shall be delayed until I can procure another beast."

As she gazed a wild plan came to Mehitable. Why not go to New York and search for Charity? And suiting the action to the word, she drifted forward from shadow to shadow until, reaching the deserted side of the coach, she climbed swiftly and surely to the top where, because of the cold, she knew that she would be unmolested the entire trip. She found someone's buffalo robe and, snuggling down into it she fell asleep.

She was awakened by the coach being rolled off from the ferry on to terra firma. Rubbing her eyes, she sleepily got to the edge of the coach and was over it. What were her fright and dismay, however, when she reached the ground, to find herself caught in a rough embrace and held prisoner.

"Ha!" gasped a hoarse voice. "What have we here, forsooth?"

A light was flashed into her face.

"A lass!" said the hoarse voice in surprise. But his grasp did not relax. Then a new voice broke into the astonished monologue of Mehitable's captor.

"What hast thou there, Jerry?" drawled the voice. And the girl, blinking at the light of the lanthorne thrust again into her face, looked up into the amused eyes of Lieutenant Freeman. To her bewilderment he began to laugh heartily and, still laughing, came toward her and