"Then her son is a rebel, too," said Sally, with dimples plumping in.
"Yes, and hath been aided in helping the rebel army, by his young kinswoman, Sara Duquesne," laughed Parson Kendall with quiet glee.
"I must go away by myself awhile," again said Maid Sally.
"And take thy good Fairy with thee," said the parson. "But return from wherever thou goest in an hour, for Goodwife Kendall and myself go to Cloverlove plantation to dine, and we go by stage, which passes there and will not return until near evening.
"I have lessons for thee to learn, and would not have thee dwell too much on the knowledge that hath come to thee, and is indeed very pleasant."
"I think the world has turned topsyturvy," said the maiden, with the look of one who dreams.
"And Fairies are but bright fancies of very human creatures," said the parson, in a low, kind voice.
It would seem that the knowledge Maid Sally now carried under the burning gold of her thick tresses was making a woman of her.
Very gay and glad at heart was she, for, had not the dearest dream of her life come true? She was a high-born damsel, and--could it be true?--the blood of her Fairy Prince was also in her veins.
But instead of being filled with foolish pride because of these things, she said wisely to herself:
"Now must I study yet more, for I would not shame in any way the people who are my people although they know me not. Some day they may know me well."
And so the maiden plunged into her books anew, and also grew skilled in embroidery, even copying the pattern on her mother's dainty cape, and copying it well too, on a skirt of fine India muslin that had lain in Mistress Brace's trunk.
A few weeks after the young Virginians had started for Boston there had come a hard battle, even the battle of Bunker Hill.
And Hotspur had borne his young master to the distant colony barely in time to take part in it, after first meeting his friends at the turnpike.
In July, Sir Percival Grandison received from his son an account of the hard contest. He told how all night he and his comrades, delicately nurtured young men all, with soft hands and lions' hearts, had worked with pick and shovel, and with the rank and file, in throwing up breastworks. And so quietly was the work done that neither a sailor in the near harbor, nor the British sentry but a little away, had heard a sound.