to be taken alive. “And then!” said the little man, poking Wall-eye in the ribs with his hook.
“What then?” inquired Tom.
“We shall do unto them as we’ve all been done by.”
“But you were never here yourself?”
“Next door to it,” returned Hookey Simpson. “I was at Strachan’s, and this old tyrant ordered me my fifties. We’ll see how he likes them himself—just for a start!”
“I wish it was Strachan’s we were coming to!” muttered Tom, with a flash of his former passion.
“It’ll be his turn next.”
“But when?”
“Tomorrow—if all goes well.”
“Then you don’t mean to stop at Castle Sullivan?” cried Tom, amazed.
“You’ll see,” rejoined Hookey, “and so shall I. There’s no saying where I may stop with seventy convicts at my back!”
Seventy convicts! That was the rough number at Castle Sullivan. Then what was this to which the little man was leading them? No petty robbery, after all? A grand rebellion instead? Tom’s heart lightened at the thought. He gazed at the confident little man—looking more like a monkey dressed up as a highwayman and perched upon a horse—and he felt that he could have followed so spirited a leader with all the spirit he himself had left but for the thing that had been done before his eyes that night. There was no more, however, to be said; they were at the farm.
At the gate (not the gate of former scenes; this one lay east beyond the stables) all dismounted but the little general, who was to keep his saddle as generals do. The
