COME, come!" went on the young man lightly. "Pay the forfeit! My arm be tired o' encircling your waist!"
"Then," said a new voice grimly, as the door beside them opened and closed so swiftly that only the faintest draught of air swept past, "then I advise ye to keep your arm where it belongs!" And the dandy was forthwith torn from his nonchalant position beside Mehitable and sent spinning across the room.
"Now," continued the newcomer, when the reeling youth had brought up against the card table and the players had started to their feet, "an I mistake not, there be a lesson in politeness to be taught here! I saw you, sir, through the window as I approached the door! You were annoying this maid, and your manners"—his tone grew icy—"your manners, I repeat, sir, need to be whipped into shape!"
But here the newcomer was interrupted by a wild cry of "John!" and the next instant Mehitable's head was buried against the buff and blue chest of her big brother. Dr. John Condit looked down at her dark curls in almost comical amazement; but when he lifted his own head, his face had darkened so ominously that the three men who watched him across the taproom, despite their combined numbers, felt odd little chills run up and down their spines.
"I did not know it was my sister whom I arrived in time to rescue from a bully and a coward!" said Doctor Condit, and there was that in his voice which made the others glance uneasily at one another. "It gives the matter a more serious aspect!"
In the instant of taut silence which followed, the hands of Jaffray and the youth sought their sword hilts. A quick glance from the third man, Hawtree, however, caused their hands to drop, although the young dandy folded his arms belligerently even as his companion spoke a suave apology.
"Ye must pardon a foolish lad, sir!" said Hawtree. "The ale, forsooth, must have gone to his head. He but jested wi' the young lady, I vow!"
"Did it go to your head, too, sir, and to the head of the other—gentleman?" asked John pointedly, placing insolent accent upon the last word and looking at them with steely eyes. "I noticed no attempt upon your part to release my sister from an embarrassing position and to administer deserved reproof to a coward who would take advantage of a maid's helplessness!"
"Nay, sir," protested the other, "we were busy wi' the cards and noticed naught! We are more than willing to offer apology to your sister!" Then as Jaffray and the youth remained silent, Hawtree glanced at them with such furious threat that, very reluctantly, they imitated his bow.
John Condit hesitated, until Mehitable nudged him. "I accept the apology," she said impatiently, not glancing toward the fireplace, but speaking with her eyes anxiously upon her brother's frowning countenance. "Come, let us not waste more time here! Let us away!" she urged. "It clears, so I will waken Cherry!" And she sprang toward her sister's chair.
John Condit, at that, was forced to bestow a stiff half bow upon the three men, who then stood watching, from beneath crafty, lowered lids, his and his sisters' departure.
Mistress Ranfield, when summoned by Doctor Condit, was again all smiles and curtseys at his unexpected appearance, though she pretended hurt at his curt refusal of supper. Her hand, however, closed eagerly around the coins he dropped into her palm in payment of his sisters' refreshment, for coins were rare and much in preference to the paper money which had been issued by Congress.
"She did not deserve to be paid in coins," observed Mehitable when, once more mounted, they were trotting off through the snow toward home. "I am sorry ye gave them her, John, for she not only said slighting things which showed her ill-will toward our mother and all the patriotic women o' Orange Valley; but she was partly to blame for this night's unpleasantness, urging the silly varlet on as she did!"
"Indeed, had I known that," said John Condit, "I would ha' given her naught, not e'en paper money, for she deserved to lose the price o' your suppers!"
Charity, who had wakened from her dreams to find herself being carried out to her pillion seat upon Dulcie by her big brother, patted his arm appealingly, for he had placed Mehitable upon his horse and had mounted himself upon Dulcie to lend support to the frail little sister.
"Nay—let us forget the unpleasantness!" she pleaded, snuggling sleepily against him. "Tell us, rather, what fortunate errand brings ye home again to us after so many months, John!"
The young army surgeon's weatherbeaten face softened as he reached behind him to pat the little, mittened hand that Charity placed confidingly in his strong grasp. "Cherry be always right, Hitty!" he suggested. "Why spoil this happy reunion? Why talk o' aught but pleasant subjects—such as my return?" he added drolly.
They all laughed and Mehitable, humming, fell to studying the star-specked dome above her, for the snow had washed the air, and the heavens seemed very close to earth.
"Besides," continued John mysteriously, after a pause, "I do, indeed, ha' something pleasant to discuss!"
He chuckled as he noticed the instant attention he received. Charity leaned forward eagerly, and Mehitable rode her horse close enough to him to stare into his face.
"Why, what" she began. She started as she felt something slipped into her hand when it brushed against his above Dulcie's fat side. Her tone changed. "A note!" she cried in rapturous amazement. "A really-truly note—for me! With—with—sealing wax and everything!"
"A note, Hitty!" Charity leaned sideways upon her pillion. "Let me feel the seal!" Then, as her sister obligingly obeyed her request, she gave an excited bounce. "It feels like the one ye got from Cousin Eliza that time from Trenton!"
Mehitable sighed gustily. "Must I wait until I get home to read it! Oh, an there were only lights along this dark lane instead o' just the stars!"
"Instead o' just the stars!" echoed John laughingly. "Be thankful, mistress, it be not cloudy and dark as last night! I had a fearful time o't, riding on dispatch business, for I lost the road more than once. As for lights along this lane, Hitty—mayhap a hundred years or more will find some, as the lamps are hung on every seventh house i' New York Town to light the streets there. Yet—that would mean houses built as closely together, side by side, row after row, ye mind, as New York hath, and 'twill be more than one hundred years before this Orange meadowland and swampland and the Mountain be populated as thickly as a' that. More like three hundred years. Therefore I fear, Hitty"—he peered at her gravely through the shadows while Charity's tinkling laugh rang out—"I greatly fear ye will not live to see lights along the First Road, here!"
Mehitable tossed her head. "I'll warrant ye there will be stranger sights around here than lights along this lane, John, before another century," she retorted. "Besides, I be old enough to wait until I get home to read the missive, I should hope!" A moment later, however, her tone changed to one of beseeching childishness. "Oh, John!" she cried inconsistently. "There be Samuel Munn's tavern, with a lanthorn swinging in front o' the door! Do let me stop beneath its light and read my note!"
"But ye said ye hoped ye were old enough to wait, Hitty!" teased her brother.
He might as well have spoken to the wind. Mehitable swerved her horse toward the tavern light and a moment later, seated in her saddle beneath its rays, she broke the note's seal with an eager thumb nail and spread it open upon her horse's neck. When she had painstakingly spelled out the fine, slanting handwriting which met her gaze, she glanced up excitedly.
"Listen, Cherry," she began, and stopped in vexed surprise. John and Charity had ridden on, and she was alone beneath the light. Because of the unbroken snow, though, the laughing pair had not gotten as far ahead of her as they had intended, and soon Mehitable's horse carried her abreast of them in the narrow road.
"'Twas a mean thing to do! A sorry jest, indeed!" she exclaimed wrathfully. But at John's grin her usual good-nature asserted itself, and she could not help grinning back at him. "Some folk ha' such childish notions o' fun!" she said, more mildly.
"And some people ha' such childish lack o' patience!" answered John promptly.
"'Tis true!" sighed Mehitable. "E'en as I was telling Master Wright this very afternoon. I suppose I might ha' waited until I reached home before reading my note! But, John," she hurried on, "know ye aught o' the contents?"
"Well," he smiled, "I knew the note was from Cousin Eliza, for she gave it me to deliver to ye at my first opportunity."
"From Cousin Eliza!" interrupted Charity in surprise. "But she lives in Trenton and John comes from Morris Town! He but now told me so!"
"Cousin Eliza lives in Trenton, 'tis true," admitted Mehitable, before her brother could speak. "It seems, however—an ye give a chance, Cherry, I will explain!—it seems she hath been visiting her old friend, Mistress Lindsley, on the Whippanong Road out o' Morris Town, and while there—indeed, almost upon her arrival, she fell and broke her ankle. 'Tis a most painful and tedious injury, she says, and the ladies o' the household being very busy, she is left much o' the time alone, for her French maid, Felice, fell sick just before she started and so had to be left at home. Now, forsooth, she wants you and me, Cherry, to come and stay awhile, wi' Mistress Lindsley's permission, to act as her nurses and companions. She says John hath promised to implore our mother to allow us to go. She says also"—Mehitable looked obliquely at her brother and laughed—"that though the menfolk o' the Lindsley family be gone much o' the time, there is to be a gay winter in the village, from all reports, wi' the nice young officers quartered there, American and French! Indeed, she hath heard already that Colonel Hamilton be planning some routs and assemblies. Would it not be wonderful!"
"Wonderful!" echoed Charity. "Oh, John, think ye Mother will let us go?"
"Why not?" asked John Condit kindly. "Besides helping poor Cousin Eliza, who hath always been good to us, I, myself, think it would be very nice to ha' my two little sisters comparatively near me for awhile."
"Then ye will help us to gain Mother's permission?" Mehitable looked at him eagerly.
"Aye," answered John laughingly, "if you think my word counts more than yours wi' our mother."
"It does!" answered Mehitable simply. "Mother thinks ye be almost perfect!"
"Nay," said John, laughing still more, "I've do not give our mother credit for good sense, Hitty, an ye say that!"
"'Tis true," returned Mehitable, "laugh as ye may, John. Mothers always like their sons better, I think," she added reflectively. "I shall, I know!"
"Hitty!" said Charity's shocked voice. Whereupon they all fell to laughing foolishly and happily.
The rest of the journey home beneath the bright stars, with the cold, crisp air reddening cheeks and—it must be admitted—noses as well, was made concocting all sorts of hilarious plans.
"It be so delightful living i' this year 1779!" exclaimed Mehitable blithely, following the others in through the Condit gate. "I would not live in any other time an I could! Think o' the past—a hundred years ago, wi' the people coming down to New Jersey in boats from Branford village in Connecticut—don't laugh, John, I ha' it all from Grannie Pierson, who hath heard her own mother tell about it. How desolate this mountain must have been then—no plantations here, no lanes, nothing but wilderness and forest and Indians! And think o' a hundred years hence, e'en wi' the lights in the lanes." She glanced saucily at her brother as she pulled up her horse and watched him dismount. "Mayhap they will not have war and any such exciting adventures as are apt to befall one now!"
"How do ye know!" jeered her brother, lifting Charity down from her pillion and approaching Mehitable's horse to lead him, with old Dulcie, to the barn. "Don't stand there shivering, Cherry—run right into the house!" he added over his shoulder. "And come, Hitty, jump down! All this beatitude," he chuckled, "because o' a most dreadful war! Fie, my foolish sister, think o' the ragged soldiers at Morris Town!"
"Oh, I do!" answered Mehitable reproachfully. "I knit ever so many socks for them, John—ye can't think! Besides," her bright face fell, "mayhap Mother will not let us go to visit Cousin Eliza at Morris Town, after all!"
But Mistress Condit, when the girls had burst in upon her, both talking excitedly at once, seemed as pleased as her daughters upon reading the note, although she sighed and said:
"Poor Eliza—for all her wealth, she seems e'er to ha' bad luck! I mind that dreadful Christmas at Trenton when she had to have all those Hessians quartered in her fine house."
There was a moment's silence as she read on. Then she exclaimed in dismay:
"Routs and assemblies! But, my dear little maids, what o' clothes! Ye ha' both outgrown the party gowns Cousin Eliza did give to ye that same Christmas I wot of! And ye cannot attend balls in homespun!" She looked from one disappointed face to another. "Never mind," she went on kindly, "Mother will find a way, somehow! Ah, my son, 'tis good to see you again!"
She turned with brightening eyes to greet her boy, and Charity watched in sympathetic silence the long embrace which spoke so eloquently of the long, hard months of separation. Mehitable, as soon as she had heard her brother outside the door, and knowing then that the matter of a visit to Morris Town would be dismissed from her mother's mind in welcoming the young soldier, had hastily filled a brass warming pan with coals from the fire and had departed to warm the beds. Charity, quietly hanging up on its wooden peg Mehitable's cape as well as her own, turned as her mother addressed her at last.
"My dear," questioned Mistress Condit, drawing her son over to a place beside her upon the fireside bench and pulling Charity down to her lap, "where were ye? Your father and I were indeed worried when supper-time came and went without any word from our little maids. We thought the storm might delay ye, but not as late as this."
"It was the snow, Mother," nodded Charity. "'Twas a bitter storm while it lasted. But, oh, such a tale as Hitty hath to tell ye—what happened as I slept i' my chair!"
Mistress Condit turned inquiringly to her son who, informed by Mehitable as they jogged toward home, was able to acquaint his mother with that which had taken place before his arrival at the Orange inn.
"Indeed, Mistress Ranfield shall hear o' this, forsooth!" exclaimed Mistress Condit indignantly, when he had finished. "I shall lay the matter before Parson Chapman when next he be home from the army. Mistress Ranfield's behavior, and her lack of protection for Hitty, is inexcusable. Oh, these Tory women—one would think they had no hearts! Common humanity should ha' kept her from encouraging such a varlet's actions!"
"Are ye sure she be Tory?" inquired John.
"Aye," answered his mother firmly. "It be common knowledge. She is, besides, a great friend o' the Williams o' the Corners!"
"Ben Williams, the Tory, ye mean?" said John thoughtfully. "Well, that may be so, yet would I take time and think the matter over. Neighbors' quarrels are apt to lead to serious things, indeed, these days."
"Mayhap ye be right, my son," returned Mistress Condit, tightening her arms around Charity. "But it angers me to ha' my little maids" she choked. "Ah, there is your father—he hath been out upon an errand. We shall hear what he doth think o' Mistress Ranfield's behavior!"
"Welcome home, John!" Samuel Condit said, in pleased surprise, blowing out the candle in the square tin lantern he was carrying, and laying hat and greatcoat hastily down upon perceiving his son by the fire. "What good wind brings ye this way?"
"One which is apt to blow two little maids back again with me whence I came, mayhap," laughed young Doctor Condit, rising to grip his father's hand and indicating the note his mother had once more picked up to peruse.
"First, however, Samuel, I must tell ye what Dame Ranfield did to our Hitty!" burst out Mistress Condit, laying down the note again. Pushing Charity from her lap, she rose and went to place her hand upon her husband's arm.
"Nay, Mother, let the matter wait," interposed John Condit appealingly, wishing he had not told his mother so soon of the incident, as he realized how four years of warfare had affected her nerves.
"Be quiet, John!" answered Mistress Condit sternly. She turned back to Squire Condit, as her son, chuckling to himself at his mother's tone, subsided meekly upon the bench beside Charity. "Now, Samuel, ye shall hear the tale!"
"Well, Mary," said the Squire soothingly, when she had ended her recital, "no need to rush into trouble. 'Twas a mean thing for the woman to have done—heartless, certainly—yet this warfare hath brought worse things to pass; and since the matter turned out as it did, better to let it drop. It was partly our fault, for an we had not allowed the girls to start off i' the face o' the storm, they need not to ha' been caught thus, and nothing would then ha' happened."
"But the man Hawtree," began Charity tremblingly. "And, oh, Mother, that Jaffray" She broke off, shuddering.
"Hawtree!" exclaimed her parents and brother together. "Jaffray!" John looked at her, astonished.
"Why did not Hitty tell me those villains were present!" he said angrily.
"Mayhap—she was afraid o' what might happen an she did, John," answered Charity, in her timid way. "Hawtree affected not to know us—I think Jaffray really did not. Mayhap neither did, since it hath been three years or more they were here."
"Strange how war doth bring such villains to light," mused Squire Condit. "That man Jaffray was naught but a river pirate, masking his plunderings beneath the British flag. As for Hawtree, he is but a hanger-on o' the army—booted out, so I heard, from the service o' the enemy. The youth be a newcomer. I do not know him."
"I like it not, their return!" exclaimed Mistress Condit uneasily. "It bodes ill for us and all patriots!"
"Well, let us not worry, my dear," said the Squire reassuringly. And for a moment there was silence in the old kitchen.
The kitchen was the living room of the Condit family, as it was in most of the farmhouses scattered along the foot of the Newark Mountains at this time. There was carried on all the routine of ordinary life; its mud-plastered walls witnessed most of the comedies and many of the tragedies of which family existence was composed, then as now. A big room, it was dwarfed by the enormous fireplace in which Charity, for all her sixteen years, could still stand upright, as well as by the nearness of the dark, smoked rafters across the low ceiling, Still, with its shining pewter upon the dresser, with a cheerful begonia plant flourishing away at every small-paned window, and the firelight playing over humans and furniture brightly and impartially, it was a room that any one could call Home.
"Father!" Mehitable's eager voice was heard calling down the stairs. The next moment, she entered and hurried to her father's side. "Hast Mother told ye aught o' Cousin Eliza's note?" she asked with shining eyes.
"Nay, not yet. Put down the warming pan, my child!" bade her father. "Take care, Hitty!" He started as Mehitable, turning too hastily toward the fireplace, allowed the hot pan, at the end of its long, clumsy handle, to graze his hand.
"Oh, Father!" She looked at him with such a mixture of alarm and remorse that the Squire had to laugh, so that, relieved, she dumped the live coals back upon the fire, and hanging up the implement, came to his side.
"Cousin - Eliza - who - be - in - Morris - Town - a-visiting - Mistress - Lindsley - hath - asked - Charity - and - me - to- stay - wi' - her - because - she - hath - a - broken - ankle," she recited rapidly. "May we, Father?"
The Squire held up his hands helplessly, while the others looked on laughingly. But before he could answer Mehitable, a loud knock sounded upon the door and reverberated through the house like thunder!
Instantly, the tension of a war-torn country settled upon the kitchen. Faces grew grave and anxious. The poor people never knew whether it was friend or foe who knocked upon their doors in New Jersey in 1779!