They were within a few rods of the Gap. As yet there was no sign of
sentinel,--not even the click of a musket was heard. "They sleep like
the dead," muttered Dyke. "We'll be on them in five minutes more."
Gaunt, keeping step with him, pressing up the hill, shivered. He thought
he saw blood on his hands. Why, this was work! His whole body throbbed
as with one pulse. Behind him, a long way, came the column; his
quickened nerves felt the slow beat of their tread, like the breathing
of some great animal. Crouching in a stubble-field at the road-side he
saw a negro,--a horse at a little distance. It was Bone; he had followed
his master: the thought passing vaguely before him without meaning. On!
on! The man beside him, with his head bent, his teeth clenched, the
pupils of his eyes contracted, like a cat's nearing its prey. The road
lay bare before them.

"Halt!" said Dyke. "Let them come up to us."

Gaunt stopped in his shambling gait.

"Look!" hissed Dyke,--"a spy!"--as the figure of a man climbed from a
ditch where he had been concealed as he ran, and darted towards the
rebel camp. "We'll miss them yet!"--firing after him with an oath. The
pistol missed,--flashed in the pan. "Wet!"--dashing it on the ground.
"Fire, Gaunt!--quick!"

The man looked round; he ran lamely,--a thick, burly figure, a haggard
face. Gaunt's pistol fell. Dode's father! the only man that loved him!

"Damn you!" shouted Dyke, "are you going to shirk?"

Why, this _was_ the work! Gaunt pulled the trigger; there was a blinding