LUCIA HAS A PLAN
"I have brought you a birthday gift, Rebby," said Lucia, who had been
looking forward all day to the moment when she could give her friend the
small package that she now handed her.
Rebecca received it smilingly, and quickly unwound the white tissue
paper in which it was wrapped, showing a flat white box. Inside this box
lay a pair of white silk mitts.
Rebecca looked at them admiringly, and even Mrs. Weston declared that
very few girls could hope for a daintier gift; while Anna and Luretta
urged Rebecca to try them on at once, which she was quite ready to do.
They fitted exactly, and Lucia was as proud and happy as Rebecca herself
that her gift was so praised and appreciated.
"They came from France," she said. "Look on the box, Rebby, and you will
see 'Paris, France.' My father bought them of a Boston merchant, and I
have a pair for myself."
"Are any more girls coming, Mother?" Rebecca asked as Mrs. Weston led
the way to the living-room.
"No, my dear. And I only----" Mrs. Weston hesitated. She had started to
say that she had only remembered Rebecca's birthday a few moments
earlier; but she stopped in time, knowing it would cloud the afternoon's
pleasure; and Rebecca, smiling and delighted with Lucia's gift, and sure
that her mother had some treat ready for them, exclaimed:
"I do not mind now so much that the _Polly_ has not arrived; for I could
have no gift finer than a pair of silk mitts."
Anna had taken off her sunbonnet and was sitting on one of the low
rush-bottomed chairs near a window. She was very quiet, reproaching
herself in her thoughts that she had no gift for her sister. What could
she give her? For little girls in revolutionary times, especially those
in remote villages, had very few possessions of their own, and Anna had
no valued treasure that might make a present. If she had remembered in
time, she thought, she would have asked her mother to help her make a
needle-book.
Suddenly she jumped up and ran across the room and kissed her sister,
first on one cheek and then on the other, saying:
"If I had golden beads in strings,
I'd give you these, and other things.
But Rebby, dear, I've only this
To give to-day: a birthday kiss."
Lucia and Luretta were sure that Anna must have had her verse all ready
to repeat; and even Rebecca, who knew that Anna rhymed words easily,
thought that Anna had prepared this birthday greeting, and was very
proud of her little sister. But at the words, "golden beads," a great
hope came into Rebecca's heart. Perhaps that was what the _Polly_ was
bringing for her.
"I am to have a rabbit," said Anna happily. "What shall I name it?"
Lucia did not seem much interested in anything so ordinary as a rabbit,
and had no suggestion to offer, and while Anna and Luretta were deciding
this question Lucia whispered to Rebecca: "When I go home be sure and
walk a little way; I want to tell you something important."
Rebby nodded smilingly. For the moment she had entirely forgotten the
uncomfortable secret that Lucia had confided in her, and was thinking
only that it was really a wonderful thing to have a fourteenth birthday.
While the four little girls were talking happily in the living-room,
Mrs. Weston was trying to think up some sort of a birthday treat for
them. There was no white sugar in the house, or, for that matter, in the
entire settlement. But the Westons had a small store of maple sugar,
made from the sap of the maple trees, and Mrs. Weston quickly decided
that this should be used for Rebecca's birthday celebration. She hurried
to the pantry, and when an hour later she opened the door and called the
girls to the kitchen they all exclaimed with delight.
The round table was covered with a shining white cloth, and Mrs. Weston
had set it with her fine blue plates, that she had brought from Boston
when she came to Machias, and that were seldom used.
By each plate stood a lustre mug filled with milk, and in the centre of
the table was a heart-shaped cake frosted with maple sugar.
"Oh, Mother! This is my very best birthday!" Rebecca declared happily,
and as the other girls seated themselves at the table she stood with
bowed head to say the "grace" of thanks before cutting her birthday
cake.
Anna wished to herself that Melvina Lyon might have been one of the
guests, and shared the delicious cake. She wondered just how Melvina
would behave on such an occasion; and was so careful with her crumbs,
and so polite in her replies to the other girls that Lucia and Rebecca
began to laugh, thinking Anna was making believe for their amusement.
Before the little girls left the table Mr. Weston appeared at the
kitchen door, and was quite ready to taste the cake, and again remind
Rebecca of the gift the _Polly_ was bringing.
"Let me whisper, Father," she responded, drawing his head down near her
own. "It's _beads_!" she whispered, and when her father laughed she was
sure she was right, and almost as happy as if the longed-for gift was
around her neck.
"Well, Paul and I found the liberty tree," said Mr. Weston, "and I cut
it down and trimmed it save for its green plume. Paul is towing it
downstream now; and when we set it up 'twill be a credit to the town."
Lucia rose quickly. "I must be going home," she said, a little flush
coming into her cheeks. "I have enjoyed the afternoon very much," she
added politely; for if Melvina Lyon was the smartest girl in the village
no one could say that any of the other little girls ever forgot to be
well-mannered.
Rebecca followed her friend to the door, and they walked down the path
together, while Anna and Luretta questioned Mr. Weston eagerly as to
Paul's success in capturing a rabbit, and were made happy with the news
that he had secured two young rabbits, and that they were safe in the
canoe which Paul was now paddling down the river, towing the liberty
tree behind him.
Rebecca and Lucia had gone but a few steps when Lucia whispered: "We
mustn't let them put up the liberty tree. Oh, Rebby, why didn't you try
to stop your father going after it?"
"How could I?" responded Rebecca. "And when I said: 'Why must Machias
have a liberty pole?' he was ill pleased with me, and said I must be
loyal to America's rights. Oh, Lucia! are you sure that----"
But Lucia's hand was held firmly over Rebby's mouth. "Ssh. Don't speak
it aloud, Rebby. For 'twould make great trouble for my father, in any
case, if people even guessed that he knew the plans of the British. But
I could not help hearing what he said to Mother the day he sailed. But,
Rebby, we must do something so the liberty pole will not be set up."
"Can't we tell my father?" suggested Rebecca hopefully.
"Oh, Rebecca Weston! If your father knew what I told you he would do his
best to have the liberty pole put up at once," declared Lucia.
"But I have a plan, and you must help me," she continued. "Paul Foster
will bring the sapling close in shore near his father's shop, and it
will rest there to-night; and when it is dark we must go down and cut it
loose and push it out so that the current will take it downstream, and
the tide will carry it out to sea. Then, before they can get another
one, the _Polly_ will come sailing in and all will be well."
"Won't the British ship come if we do not put up the liberty pole?"
asked Rebecca.
"There! You have said it aloud, Rebby!" whispered Lucia reprovingly.
"Not all of it; but how can we go out of our houses in the night,
Lucia?" replied Rebecca, who had begun to think that perhaps Lucia's
plan was the easiest way to save the village. For Lucia had told her
friend that the _Polly_, of which Lucia's father was captain, and the
sloop _Unity_, owned and sailed by a Captain Jones of Boston, would be
escorted to Machias by an armed British ship; and if a liberty pole was
set up the British would fire upon the town. So it was no wonder that
Rebecca was frightened and ready to listen to Lucia's plan to avert the
danger.
She did not know that her father and other men of the settlement were
already beginning to doubt the loyalty of the two captains to America's
cause.
"It will be easy enough to slip out when everybody is asleep," Lucia
replied to Rebecca's question. "We can meet at Mr. Foster's shop. If I
get there first I will wait, and if you get there before me you must
wait. As near ten o'clock as we can. And then it won't take us but a few
minutes to push the sapling out into the current. Just think, Rebby, we
will save the town, and nobody will ever know it but just us two."
Rebby sighed. She wished that Lucia's father had kept the secret to
himself. Besides, she was not sure that it was right to prevent the
liberty pole from being set up. But that the town should be fired upon
by a British man-of-war, and everyone killed, as Lucia assured her, when
it could be prevented by her pushing a pine sapling into the current of
the river, made the little girl decide that she would do as Lucia had
planned.
"All right. I will be there, at the blacksmith shop, when it strikes ten
to-night," she agreed, and the friends parted.
Rebecca walked slowly toward home, forgetting all the joy of the
afternoon; forgetting even that it was her fourteenth birthday, and that
a string of gold beads for her was probably on board the _Polly_.
Paul Foster towed the fine sapling to the very place that Lucia had
mentioned, and his father came to the shore and looked at it admiringly
as he helped Paul make it secure. "It is safely fastened and no harm can
come to it," Mr. Foster said after they had drawn the tree partly from
the water. Paul drew his canoe up on the beach, and taking the rabbits
in the stout canvas bag, started for home.
Anna and Luretta were both on the watch for him, and came running to
meet him. Anna now wore her every-day dress of gingham, and in her
eagerness to see the rabbits she had quite forgotten to try and behave
like Melvina Lyon.
"Why, it is a pity to separate the little creatures," Paul declared,
when Luretta told him that she had promised one to Anna. "See how close
they keep together. And this box is big enough for them both. And they
are so young they must be fed very carefully for a time."
"I know what we can do," declared Anna; "my rabbit can live here until
he is a little larger, and then my father will make a box for him and I
can take him home."
Paul said that would do very well, and that Anna could come each day and
learn how to feed the little creatures, and what they liked best to eat.
"But which one is to be mine? They are exactly alike," said Anna, a
little anxiously. And indeed there was no way of telling the rabbits
apart, so Anna and Luretta agreed that when the time came to separate
them it would not matter which one Anna chose for her own.
At supper time Anna could talk of nothing but the rabbits, and had so
much to say that her father and mother did not notice how silent Rebecca
was.
The little household retired early, and by eight o'clock Rebecca was in
bed, but alert to every sound, and resolved not to go to sleep. The
sisters slept together, and in a few minutes Anna was sound asleep.
Rebecca heard the clock strike nine, then very quietly she got out of
bed and dressed. Her moccasins made no noise as she stepped cautiously
along the narrow passage, and down the steep stairway. She lifted the
big bar that fastened the door and stood it against the wall, then she
opened the door, closing it carefully behind her, and stepped out into
the warm darkness of the spring night.