Milady at Arms/Chapter 9
A MOMENT later, as though feeling the urge of her strong, if silent, appeal to him, young Zenas Williams raised his eyes to her pleading gaze. Instantly, Sally's hands were fluttering in a wild gesture imploring retreat and the boy was quick to seize her meaning. A little later only the waving corn stalks of the field could be seen above the sharp ascent of the Mountain road to Northfield—only the corn stalks and Sally, once more seated demurely upon her rock by the wayside, fanning herself lazily with a corner of her apron!
Clickety-clack! Clickety-clack! As she Hstened tensely, the horse's trot dwindled to a walk, the walk to the amble of a tired beast, and when at last the steed and his rider did appear, they were approaching so slowly that both were easily recognizable. Sally, gazing eagerly, forgot her nonchalance and leaped to her feet. For the rider was Uzal Ball, himself!
She ran out into the road, appearing so unexpectedly as to cause Uzal's horse to shy violently. He was too good a rider to be unseated, and the road was too steep for the beast to bolt after his first nervous start; but the gaze which Uzal was at last able to fix upon Sally's flushed, excited face was a reproving one.
"Nay, Sally, was it necessary to scare my horse into galloping all you way to Northfield?" he inquired severely. He drew firm rein and, remaining seated, stared down at her in puzzled surprise. "I thought ye were at Mistress Williams's?"
"I was—until this morn," explained the girl hastily. "Nay, Uzal, be not angry! I be here to warn ye!" Here a swift vision of Gerald Lawrence, of what he would have done under similar circumstances, of his grave courtesy, his instant dismounting, hat in hand, involuntarily crossed her mind. Never would she have had to stop and apologize to Jerry for having appeared unexpectedly, nervous horse or no! "I—I was about to ride across the Mountain path," faltered Sally, "to tell ye to fly!"
"Fly!" Now it was Uzal's turn to start. He stared down at her almost angrily. "What mean ye?" he demanded in a harsh voice.
"I mean," said Sally breathlessly, her hands clasped, "I mean that James Williams and a company o' cavalry be even now on their way across the Second Road to take ye prisoner for your activities against their odious King!"
"I—a prisoner?" Uzal repeated it almost stupidly.
"Aye, Uzal, aye!" Sally's copper-colored head nodded excitedly. "Oh, what good fortune to meet ye thus and that James Williams and his friends are to be cheated o' their prey! Ye must not return home, Uzal!"
"But I was not returning home!" protested Uzal, in an offended voice. "I was on my way to Morris Town!"
"So much the better!" cried Sally. "Continue thy journey—'tis the very thing! For the British will doubtless return to Staten Island e'er long, and James Williams may not find it so easy to secure aid for his schemes next time, forsooth!"
Dumbly, Uzal touched his hat brim, then, and digging his heels into his nag's sides, he started off, leaving Sally to gaze after him. But he had not gone far when he drew sudden rein, turned his horse around, and trotted back to her.
"I—I—believe I owe ye thanks, Sally," he muttered curtly, then. "'Twas kind o' ye to ha' thought o' warning me—going through the forest and all! I—I be grateful to ye!"
"Nay, Uzal, 'twas naught!" Sally shrugged a debonair shoulder.
But suddenly Uzal looked at her almost suspiciously, as though struck by a thought. "Ye were truly going to warn me, Sally? This be not a jest?" he asked doubtfully.
"Aye."
"Then where be thy horse?"
Sally laughed. "Ye demand proof, Uzal?" Pointing toward the spot where Zenas had disappeared, she called to the boy: "Ho, Zenas!"
Promptly, in answer, the lad scrambled forth between the corn, dragging Sally's horse after him, by its halter.
"Nay," said Uzal quickly, with bent brows. "I—I was but puzzled! I—I—meant not to show doubt o' ye! I—I—saw no horse, and—and—I"
"I understand," said the girl with deliberate kindness. "Indeed, I do not blame ye for being mystified, since thy house be a long ways from here, and walking, I could not ha' warned ye in time!" Again, involuntarily, the thought of Jerry's undoubting gratefulness swept Sally's mind; but she told herself Uzal had been bred in a sterner, more practical way—it was not his fault that everything must be explained in detail to him. She turned to Zenas, who had reached them. "We are saved the trouble o' warning Master Ball, ye see! And he be saving himself a vastly unpleasant journey to New York Town by starting forth to Morris Town."
Uzal turned to Zenas, who gave him back his greeting gloomily. It was almost as though the boy were regretting so tame an ending to what had promised to be an adventure.
"Well," sighed Uzal, touching his hat brim with two stiff fingers, "I will e'en bid ye farewell! I shall come for ye, Sally, when my mother doth return from Morris Town. Stay ye, then, wi' Mistress Williams, as arranged."
As the boy and girl stood in the road, gazing after the awkward figure making slow progress upon its horse, Zenas suddenly muttered something.
"What said ye?" Sally turned to look inquiringly at him.
"I said," repeated Zenas, spinning upon his heel and starting downhill, leading Sally's horse, "I said, methought 'twas a vast amount o' work for a mite o' thanks, Sally!"
"He gave me thanks, Zenas," returned Sally quickly, following the boy and the horse.
"Did he, indeed?" Zenas flung her a grumpy look over his shoulder. "'Twas not so hearty as some, mayhap!"
"Ah, ye be hungry and much too warm!" laughed Sally. "'Tis not Uzal, but ye who be at fault, my lad!"
All the same, however, in her heart of hearts, Sally could not help but think, too, that Uzal had not been properly appreciative of the service she had been willing to bestow upon him, could not help but compare him to Jerry Lawrence. As a matter of fact, she really wronged poor, inarticulate Uzal, who could gaze with dumb, longing eyes at the beauty of the skies, of the birds, of Sally, and yet not be able to put to words the song they created in his soul.
It was long past noon before the bullet-makers had finished their task and returned to Mistress Harrison's. Sally had busied herself preparing dinner, assisted by Chloe and another slave, so that the weary women, coming in from the cornfield, were greeted by the sight of hot viands set forth upon a long table which Zenas had made with planks under some great chestnut trees.
"Ye be a good little housewife, Sally," said Mistress Keturah beamingly, "to go ahead thus for me!"
Mistress Williams turned away from the four-poster bed upon which she had laid the little sleeping Nathaniel. "Zenas tells me there was a raiding party come this morn," she said, half questioningly.
Sally stared hard at the boy, who had followed his mother into the cabin. "Aye," she answered evasively, trying to catch Zenas's eye.
"How did the news o' our bullet-making reach the enemy, suppose ye?" interrupted Mistress Harrison. But the next instant, to Sally's enormous relief, the hostess grasped Mistress Williams by the arm playfully. "Hear ye! The rest be calling to us. Best hurry or I vow those hungry women will leave us naught to eat!" And, giggling like two girls, the middle-aged friends hurried out of the cabin door without waiting for an answer to Mistress Harrison's question.
Sally flew at Zenas, when he would have followed. "An ye mention that raiding party again, Zenas Williams," she whispered fiercely in his ear, "I will—I will—nay, I don't know what I will do! Put salt in thy mug o' milk, mayhap, or persuade thy mother to gi' ye no more pence for spending, as she sometimes does!"
With belligerent folded arms, Sally stood before Zenas, still barring his way. "Nay," she went on hotly, "I would not ha' your mother know for aught 'twas James who led the enemy hence! Twould break Mistress Williams's heart, I fear."
"Hearts be tougher than that, Sally," responded the boy sagely. He looked at her in sudden grimness. "Ye do not gi' my mother credit for the good sense she doth possess! Do ye not suppose she knows James, aye, and Amos, too, do be on Tory side, and mayhap my father! It matters not to her—she be patriot, and that be enough."
Sally thought remorsefully of her suspicions toward Mistress Williams. "Think ye your father truly be Tory, too?" she asked hesitatingly. "He hath not really said, ye mind—at least, not since I ha' been wi' ye!"
"But he is!" said Zenas, in a low voice. "Only my mother and I—we be patriots!"
"Zenas"—Sally's hands dropped to her sides; she moved a step nearer to him—"how could James, think ye, betray to the enemy his own mother?"
Zenas shrugged his shoulders at the horror in the girl's voice. "Nay, he doubtless had bond that Mother would not be hurt, and"—the boy snapped his fingers—"what cared he what happened to the rest o' the women?"
Sally groaned softly. "Neighbor against neighbor! Think ye, Zenas, many o' the women he would betray to the cruelty o' the red-coats he hath known since childhood! How terrible!"
But Zenas suddenly grinned, rolling his eyes toward the door. "Not half so terrible," he said, "as missing our dinner. Nay"—he stepped past Sally determinedly—"an ye do not wish to eat, I prithee let me go, for I be ravenous as a wolf! I see Mother hath saved a place for us, one on each side o' her!" And his sturdy legs bore him out the cabin door toward the dinner table.
Sally, following more slowly, pondered the fine courage and the bravery of Mistress Mary Williams. It seemed more than human to be able to bear with such sweet patience the trouble this fateful year of 1777 had brought to her and was doomed, still more, to bring!
But if trouble or care were present at that gay gathering of patriot women that noon, not a whit of it was displayed. It was not until Mistress Harrison rose to her feet, rapping upon the table plank for silence as she slowly looked around her, that tongues ceased to wag and the laughter was stilled. But now grave attention was given to her words.
"Neighbors," she said, "we ha' done a good morning's work; but now the question comes—what shall be done wi' the product o' our hands? Since Mistress Ball do be absent, whom do ye appoint to take charge o' the bullets and whence wish ye them taken?"
There was a murmur of voices until Mistress Harrison held up her hand again.
"Ye all be interested in our 'Jersey Blues'," she said. "Someone hath suggested that the bullets be given to them, in charge o' their captain, Eliakim Littell. Is that agreeable?"
At that, the ladies nodded their heads and Zenas sprang to his feet.
"Let me be the one to fetch the bullets!" he pleaded.
Mistress Harrison looked at him thoughtfully before she answered, then she nodded. "You be o'er young, lad; but I doubt not ye could do it, an your mother will consent." Mistress Williams nodded silently, and her friend continued: "But there be more bullets than ye can carry on one horse, Zenas. Alas!" She turned suddenly and despairingly to the rest of the company. "We are indeed short o' men! Simeon be far too busy i' the fields to help us, and I know, of a certainty, most o' your husbands be likewise occupied, or else wi' His Excellency. This business o' being soldier and farmer, wi' fighting to be accomplished and the harvest to be sown and garnered at home, makes it doubly hard for our brave men. I' good sooth, did they not ha' the added incentive o' fighting for their very homes, methinks they could not win o'er such great odds!"
Silence settled down over the long table. Each woman's face as she sat beside it listening, with clenched hands in her lap or lying upon the board before her, was a study in determination and grim patience. Each face, young or middle-aged, showed pathetically the hardships and burdens she was sharing, the burden of supporting an uncertain cause, the burden of physical hard work, most of all, the burden of anxiety regarding some dear one's safety.
At last the silence was broken by Sally. All this time, with flushed cheeks and beating heart, she had been sitting motionless beside Mistress Williams. Now she sprang to her feet, one slender brown hand against her heart as she looked pleadingly first at Mistress Williams and Mistress Harrison, then at the others.
"Will ye not allow me to help Zenas carry the bullets to the Town by the River?" she asked in a low voice.
The ladies glanced at each other. Sally could see assent upon most of their faces. Here, their expressions seemed to say, is one who has no family ties to prevent her from going, who would not be as sorely missed, if worst should come to worst, as the others! This hurt poor Sally, even while she realized that these honest-faced women were only dumbly expressing the truth—that the very lack of a home and family made her an invaluable messenger.
"Aye, Sally," said Mistress Williams finally, in response to an inquiring look bent upon her by Keturah Harrison. "Ye may help Zenas and then return wi' him to my house, for, while there be ever danger i' this war time, I see no added risk for ye to go now. Good dames," she got to her tired feet and turned to the others, "I must back to mine own work, which waits for me as it does for ye, I ha' no doubt! Let us adjourn, then, and bid our hostess thanks for this meal. An it be decided where we shall meet next time, I gather word will be brought, as before." And the gathering broke up with that murmur of voices ever attendant upon a feminine gathering.
It was mid-afternoon before Zenas had finished his work and, with slave help, had slung the heavy saddlebags over his and Sally's horses, and they were off. Hot, hot the sun beat down. They soon passed that junction of the Second Road—sometimes called the Dark Lane—with the First Road, which is now West Orange Center, soon passed the Old Burial Ground and were well on their way to the settlement.
Sally drew her ugly sunbonnet forward over her eyes for, although the sun was at her back, the dazzling glare on dusty road and on the gravestones in the Burial Ground blinded her. Zenas continually removed his three-cornered hat to wipe his streaming brow. They rode silently, for it was too warm to make conversation. It was only when they were passing the church that Sally, glancing sidelong past the scoop of her sunbonnet, uttered an exclamation, then turned her face quickly forward again.
"Do not look, Zenas," she said in a low voice to the boy, who had fallen back beside her, "lest ye alarm them! This very moment methought I saw James peering at me from the door o' you church!"
"James!" muttered Zenas skeptically. "Nay, what would he here, Sally? He is on his way to the Ball House!"
"Indeed, I am positive 'twas James!" said Sally. "He was talking to that villain Stockton—the one who took me to New York, ye mind, as prisoner!" She shuddered nervously. "Let us trot!" she implored.
Zenas, who had turned in his saddle in spite of the girl's protest, now drew an excited breath and dug his heels into his horse's sides.
"Aye, 'tis James! And he hath leaped upon a horse—aye, and t'other! Ride ye, Sally!" cried Zenas. "Ride ye as the wind, for they come!"
Now the two horses galloped neck to neck. They were handicapped by the heavy saddlebags which thumped them at every foot—not only them, but which flopped and bumped against the riders' legs, as well.
"N-nay, Ze-Zenas!" gasped Sally at last. "We cannot stand this—this pace long! Let us turn in at Master Munn's Tav-tavern! James will not—not dare to follow us, for he—he knows Master Munn be—be—patriot!"
She reckoned without James Williams's impetuous nature, however. Barely had Sally and Zenas reached the training ground, across from which stood Samuel Munn's Tavern; barely had they drawn rein so abruptly that their steeds were thrown almost upon their haunches, to ride around the inn to the stable yard, than James dashed through the gate, followed by the thin, wiry figure of Stockton, who was minus a uniform. Straight up to the great inn barn rode James, where he dismounted and called to Zenas.
The latter, pressing back into the shadows inside the stable, whither he and Sally had hastily led their horses, gestured to the girl not to stir or answer.
"Ho, Zenas!" called James, with all the authority of an older brother to a younger one. "Come forth, ye young fool—I saw ye enter here!"
"Art sure?" Stockton, upon his horse, pursed his lips dubiously, eying the barn door with blinking gaze, for the lowering sun shone full into his close-set eyes. Sally, returning his gaze from the depths of the dusky barn interior, knew that he could not see her, blinded as he was. "Art sure, sir? I see them not!"
"Ye saw them turn in here, did ye not?" asked James angrily. He turned back to the stable door. "Ye will be brought forth, then?" he taunted. And coming straightway into the barn, dragged a bitterly protesting Zenas out into the sunlight, followed slowly by Sally, leading the horses, for, still upon her own, she had leaned over to capture the reins of Zenas's horse.
"Now!" James let go of the younger boy's collar so roughly that the other staggered, would have fallen had he not brought up reeling against Sally's horse. "What mischief be ye brewing, young jackanapes, eh?"
Sally spoke up. "Why do ye pursue us?" she demanded hotly. "We be but on an errand for your mother!"
"Ho, who gave ye privilege to speak, milady?" inquired James. "Shut thy trap and do not interfere where ye are not asked!"
"Quarreling wi' the wench gets us naught," interposed Stockton sourly, who preferred to do the quarreling himself. He pointed at Sally. "What hath she there, tied to her saddle?"
Sally started, tried to conceal her chagrin; but James's quick eyes caught it. "Ah, trouble here!" he exclaimed in a voice of triumph. "Methought that ye were in too much o' a hurry, Zenas!"
Striding toward Sally's horse, with obvious intention of rifling the saddlebags to determine their contents, he was interrupted by a young whirlwind. It was Zenas!
"Touch—touch you bags, will ye!" snarled Zenas. Sally, staring, clasped her hands as the two lads went to the ground, to roll over and over, each trying to gain the mastery of the other. Grave as the situation was, though, Sally could scarcely control hysterical laughter, for poor Zenas looked like nothing more than a bantam rooster, with his angry red face, his three-cornered hat flung into the dirt and his queue unloosed to stand on end like a cock's comb. "I'll—I'll teach ye! I'll teach ye!" he kept panting.
But, despite his courage, the odds were against the plucky fellow. Even as Stockton hastily was dismounting to participate in the already uneven battle, James deftly caught his brother's body in a scissors clinch between his knees and then rolled him over to twist his hands behind him and so jerk him to his feet, to hold him thus captive.
Sally leaned forward upon her horse. "Brave James!" she applauded sarcastically. Then her voice changed. "Are ye not ashamed to badger poor Zenas thus?" she cried. "For all ye know, your mother may ha' sent us wi' grain for poor ill Granny White near the Dark Woods, and ye fain would play the hero and—and—keep the poor old woman from her meal! He upon ye!"
James, at that, faltered. "Grain?" he muttered. "Grain for Granny White?" He suddenly laughed. "Ye will have to think o' a better story than that, milady, for I took her grain to Granny White for Mother, myself, day before yesterday!"
Sally's gaze shifted, then she shook her head. "Nay," she was commencing, desperately, "methinks 'twas not for Granny White, after all! It was for"
"Samuel Munn, doubtless!" interrupted James ironically. "Since the fat innkeeper doth need it so badly!" He frowned, all at once. "Get down, wench," he ordered surlily, "and try no more tricks upon me! What said ye, sir?" Still holding Zenas's hands behind him, James turned at the Tory's exclamation.
"I said," repeated Stockton, startled out of his usual superciliousness, as his fingers busily prodded the saddlebags on Zenas's horse, "methinks I feel bullets!"
"Bullets!" James turned upon Sally, as she reluctantly slid down from her horse. "So," he jeered, "that was what my mother was about this morn, after all! Bullet moulding, eh? Well, we be the gainers for it." And his young mouth became set and grim.
Sally glanced around the deserted stable yard helplessly, and Zenas groaned. Then, all at once, the girl screamed for help.
James only grinned. "Ye gain nothing by screeching!" he mocked. "Think ye we did not know Samuel Munn was absent before we followed ye here? Take us for boobies, mistress?"
But again Sally's cries shattered the sunlit stillness of the inn yard. "Help! Help!" Then Stockton's hand was clamped over the girl's mouth.
"Odd's fiends!" James had torn a piece of hemp from his pocket and was busily binding his brother's hands behind him. He glanced up impatiently at Stockton. "Could ye not keep her quiet, sir?" he snapped. "Not that it will do ye any good an ye yell!" he added to Sally.
But all at once his jaw dropped. For out of the kitchen door came pelting Samuel Munn and a stout hostler, as well. And Stockton and James were caught in their, own net, for the innkeeper posted the other man, armed with a heavy club, at the stable gate.
"Now, good sirs, canst tell the reason o' this disturbance?" said Master Munn, advancing to them.
James Williams turned to him sullenly. "There be no need for interference here, Master Munn," he said coolly. "My mother bade me after Zenas, here, who, stealing some o' her best silver and much else besides, was making toward the Town by the River wi' this wench—the Todds' bond maid! My friend and I did pursue them at my mother's request. That be all, sir! Naught for outsiders' business, as ye can see!"
Samuel Munn scratched a puzzled head. "Well," he was beginning undecidedly when Zenas, who had been too astounded to speak, advanced with blazing eyes.
"That be a lie!" cried Zenas. "My mother be sending Sally and me" Here his gaze fell upon Sally, who shook her head at him violently. He faltered. "We be going at my mother's behest, sir. I swear to that! I cry your aid, good Master Munn!"
The innkeeper scratched his head again. "Nay, I be no hand for mysteries," he was beginning irritably, when his glance chanced to rest upon Stockton. Even as the tavern master gazed, the Tory's malignant eyes shot a look of hatred at the hostler who was posted at the stable gate. Master Munn's own glance grew keen and watchful.
"Yonder fellow hath not an honest look," he was thinking, when Sally broke away from Stockton's restraining grasp. Running forward, she pulled Master Munn aside.
"Ye do know me, sir," she said hurriedly. "These"—her voice dropped so that her listener had to bend his head to catch her words—"these bags contain bullets for Captain Littell o' the 'Jersey Blues,' sir. Your own wife did help to mould them, sir! Oh, cannot ye detain these Tories and gi' us aid?"
At that, Samuel Munn nodded. His kind, jolly face had instantly sobered. And now Sally, glancing up at him imploringly, saw that she had not appealed in vain, for here was a true patriot.
"Ho, 'Sias, watch you gate!" His sinewy hand fell heavily upon James Williams's shoulder, and he turned to Stockton. But he turned too late! That gentleman had leaped to his horse and was off, past the astonished 'Sias who, instead of offering resistance, could only stand with mouth agape and eyes popping, staring after the horse which had so nearly ridden him down and was now disappearing in a cloud of dust toward Newark.
"Zounds take the man for a fool!" For a moment Sally thought Master Munn was going to have a fit of apoplexy, so deeply purple did he turn. But the next moment he gave a roar of laughter and pointed helplessly at the comical figure of 'Sias, although his hand did not loosen hold on James. "Hist!" gurgled and choked Master Munn. "Now will ye hear what 'Sias would have done had he had the chance!" And amid fresh roars of laughter from his master, 'Sias's voice, indeed, could be heard droning on and on about his own prowess and lack of opportunity to prove it, as he shook his heavy club and gestured largely.
Sally, however, turned forlorn eyes upon mine host. "Well," she said unhappily, "this does indeed add trouble to our journey, for while that man be loose, sir, there be danger!"
Master Munn, at that, sobered. "How so, Sally?" he asked kindly.
"Cannot ye see?" Sally made a helpless gesture. "Wi' that man escaped, there can be no doubt that he will wait along the road, some place, and surprise us, wi' danger to our burden!"
"Nay, Sally, ye did not think I would let ye and Zenas go on alone after failing ye thus!" Master Munn, as he spoke, swung James around by the collar, marched him across the tavern yard to the stable, where, opening a small door which led into a saddle room, he thrust the unwilling captive inside. "There!" exclaimed Master Munn, securing the door from the outside. "Let young Williams ponder his politics, now!"
"But the window!" pointed out Sally.
"Nay, the window be tightly wedged shut!" Master Munn turned inquiringly toward Zenas, ambled back to him.
"Ho, mean ye to let me stay wi' my hands bound?" grumbled the boy.
"Poor Zenas!" Sally flew ahead of Master Munn to tug and yank at the stout knot James had tied the hemp into around his brother's wrists.
"Nay, thy pretty fingers be too frail! Let me!" And with one slash of his hunting knife. Master Munn had the knot cut. Then, as Zenas rubbed the red marks from his wrists, he nodded at both him and Sally. "Wait for me yonder," he said. "I will but find my coat and meet ye there. Ho, 'Sias, mine horse, fellow—around at t'other door!"
Sally, once more upon her horse, watched Zenas sympathetically as he chafed his wrists which, even in the short time they had been bound, had become swollen. "'Tis the fortunes o' war, Zenas," she said at last. "Next time may be thy turn!"
"I'll fortunes o' war him!" ejaculated Zenas angrily. "The varlet! Where did Master Munn put him?" he added questioningly.
"I' the stable room," said Sally.
"I—I wonder an he will be safe?"
"What mean ye?" asked Sally wonderingly. "He cannot escape."
Zenas flushed. "I mean—think ye no one will come along and—and hurt him?" he continued nervously. "I would not want any patriot to hang"—Zenas gulped—"to hang James for treason!"
Sally paled. "Nay, I know not! Let us ask Master Munn to let him go!" And she started to climb down from her horse. Just at that moment, however, Master Munn issued from the tap-room door of his inn, and she called anxiously to him. He listened to her stammering fears and then chuckled.
"A fine pair o' war birds ye be!" he said. "What would ye? Give James back the freedom he hath but now misused against ye?"
"We-ell," Sally was commencing. But Samuel Munn shook his head.
"Nay, ha' no fears!" he told them. "James be in no danger at all, and 'twill do him no harm to sit i' the saddle room for a while after the mean trick he played upon ye, Zenas! Too many admirers o' good Mistress Mary Williams be i' this settlement for aught o' harm to come to one o' her sons, Tory though he be! Nay, let him be! Who knows," mine host stopped to chuckle, "who knows, James may come out o' you a good patriot!"
"Ye do not know James!" declared James's brother grimly, however. "He be that stubborn that confinement will only make him more bitter Tory!"
"Mayhap!" Master Munn shrugged indifferent shoulders. "But we will let him cool his heels, ne'ertheless! I ha' told 'Sias, an we be not back this even, to ope the door at dark, in time for him to find his way home to supper!"
He turned toward his horse, which 'Sias at that moment led up, when Sally, whose idle gaze had been fixed upon the road toward the Mountain, uttered an exclamation.
Master Munn paused with one foot in the stirrup, turned toward her. "Eh?" he asked.
"Yon comes a rider i' desperate hurry!" cried Sally, pointing excitedly in the direction she was staring. Everyone's eyes turned to follow her pointing finger, and Master Munn stepped to the ground and went around his horse to the center of the road. "He rides hard!" he ejaculated. And stepped back out of the way as the horse and rider reached the waiting group and the former was reined in so hard he went up on his hind legs.
"A warning!" cried the militiaman, whom Sally now recognized to be one of the Todds' neighbors. "Report to your company, sir, at once, and spread ye this message as ye go! The enemy be reported as landing at Elizabeth Town Point and also as approaching up the Hackensack from Staten Island! There be rumors o' battle at the Town by the River soon! Haste ye!" And, with a forward leap, the messenger was off again upon his heaving horse, soon disappearing down the road.
Samuel Munn turned a sobered face upon the two young folk who stared back at him. "This gives a different aspect, again," he said seriously. "I cannot go wi' ye, for both 'Sias and I must report to our militia company at once. Best return wi' your burdens to the Mountain and there seek counsel wi' the women who sent ye! 'Twill not be safe for ye to go to Newark, now!"
With a grave nod, the tavern keeper returned to the door, where waited a maid with his powder horn and musket. Then, with 'Sias at his side, also equipped, he set forth upon a run, motioning to the maid to take care of his horse.
Zenas and Sally looked at each other. "This be a fine kettle o' fish!" said the boy, at last. "But we had best do as he bade us, Sally. Let us return the bullets to Mistress Harrison for safe keeping!"
But Sally shook her head. "Never!" she cried passionately. "Think ye we are going to admit failure by such a deed? Nay, let us on to the Town by the River! An the enemy come, all the more need for these bullets we bring to the 'Jersey Blues'!"
And picking up her horse's reins, Sally set out at a brisk trot toward the Town by the River.