"Ye-es, I know," responded Luke. "They came jest about as nigh as that to hangin' me, they did. The bloodthirsty pirates! Get ashore, now, Allen. I'll land your furs for ye. I hope your concern'll make a good thing out of 'em."
"Finest furs you ever saw," laughed Allen. "Look out for spies and searchers. Here's good success to good King George--Washington, and may the glorious flag of England float victoriously--till we pull it down! Luke Watts, I'm the poisonest kind of Tory, I am!"
"Jest like me," said Watts. "I've done all I can to put down this 'ere wicked rebellion."
"I've heard so," said Allen. "We got the news all the way from Connecticut. You delivered a whole ship's cargo of heavy guns and muskets and ammunition to the loyal-hearted Tories of New London. I was born there once, myself. I know just how faithfully they love their king and his blessed Parliament. Good-by, Luke! A successful voyage to you. Keep out o' the way of pirates."
"I must, this time," said Watts. "If I don't, I'll never get another ship to carry furs and things in."
Up on deck they went, and the last words uttered by Allen did not have to be whispered.
"Take good care of your neck, Captain," he called out, from his boat. "If you're caught, this time, you'll never see New York again, or Marblehead, either."
"I guess he's about right," said Mate Brackett, gazing after the boat. "I'd say you seem to be a man that the rebels have set a mark on."
"Never you mind," said Watts. "We won't be ketched by 'em, that's all. The commodore says we may sail our own course. We'll git there."
"All right, sir," said Brackett. "We've a queer lot o' chaps with us this trip, but we'll work 'em."
What he meant by that was that all the prime seamen were needed by the war-ships, and that almost anything on two feet had been deemed good enough for an old transport ship going home in ballast.
"We'll have to travel under light canvas, I take it," remarked Brackett, as he looked at his crew. "It'd be all night and part o' next day for them to shorten sail in a hurry."
The boat which carried Mr. Allen, the loyal fur trader, reached the shore. On getting out of it, he walked until he came to a dwelling a short distance easterly from what the fire had left of old Pearl Street. He entered without knocking and passed through the house to the kitchen in the rear, where a comely, middle-aged woman stood before an open fireplace, watching a pot which was hanging on the crane.