If he could only escape! There must be some way! If he could but find one! His single word would save the lives of thousands and prevent irreparable defeat! Again he clutched the waist of the man in front of him and again the man divined.
"It ain't no use," he said, although his tone was gentle, and in a way sympathetic.

"After all, it's your own fault.

You blundered right in our way, an' we had to take you for fear you'd see us, an' give the alarm.
It was your unlucky chance.

You'd give a million dollars if you had it to slip out of our hands and tell Ulysses Grant that Albert Sidney Johnston with his whole army is layin' in the woods right alongside of him, ready to jump on his back at dawn, an' he not knowin' it." "I would," said Dick fervently.
"An' so would I if I was in your place.

Just think, Mr.Mason, that of all the hundreds of thousands of men in the Northern armies, of all the twenty or twenty-five million people on the Northern side, there's just one, that one a boy, and that boy you, who knows that Albert Sidney Johnston is here." "Held fast as I am, I'm sorry now that I do know it." "I can't say that I blame you.