"Do you think 'my father's son' will draw back on such excuse at this
hour!" I said.
He laughed ruefully, and raised his hail for granny.
"Ho, Goody! Goody, hast lain abed all day! Here are two hungry
forest-runners will eat your kitchen bare."
Granny tripped into the hall, a mug of bitter ale in either hand.
"I heard what you said, and Master Harry's answer," she rebuked him.
"Think shame on yourself, Robert, to hint that he would hesitate
before peril--and you sending him into it, too," she added somewhat
illogically, I thought. "Now, do both of you drain these. 'Twill
wash the taste of the streets and taverns from your mouths."
We obeyed her.
"And what luck did you have?" she demanded next.
"He leaves us Saturday," said Juggins simply.
She cried out.
"So soon! Must it be, Robert? Sure, the lad should have some
respite from toil and fear!"
"If he is to go, he must go then," rejoined Juggins. "'Twas because
I felt as you did that I said what you heard, granny."
"And 'twas because he had a sound heart in him that he answered as he
did," she snapped. "If he is to go, he should go, I dare say; and
the greater the peril, the greater the reward. Now come with me.
The meal is made ready."
She plied us with questions as we ate, demonstrating a keenness of
mind that continually amazed me.
"So Master Murray hath engaged three berths on his own behalf, aside
from the Frenchman," she commented. "Who could he have with him?"
"The negro servant," I hazarded.
"That is true," assented Juggins. "He is Tom, Murray's body-guard.
An evil brute, by all accounts."
"But still there is a third place," insisted granny.
"Another servant!" I suggested.
Juggins shook his head.
"I have had our men watched as well as may be, but never have we seen
a trace of any other follower or servant."
"Have you done aught towards securing Master Harry's equipment?" she
inquired.
"No," he answered. "The less he is cumbered with the better. All he
needs for forest work he can find to better advantage in New York."
"But arms!" she pressed.
"There I have somewhat will be of aid to him," he agreed.
And he went to a cupboard, from which he produced a bundle of rolled
cloths. Layer after layer was unwound, and finally he drew from the
wrappings a gun such as I had never seen before. It was long in the
barrel, well-stocked, yet very light and handy.
"You may exclaim over it, Master Harry," remarked Juggins as he
surrendered it into my admiring hands; "but you can have no idea of
its value until you have seen it tested in the great forests, where a
man's life depends upon the swiftness and accuracy with which he can
shoot. I learned that in my own youth, and so when I returned to
London I had this gun made for me by the King's own gunsmith, after
plans I drew for him. There is none other like it."
"And it is for me?" I asked, delighted as a child with a new toy.
"What better use could it have?" he replied. "Oh, yes, and these go
with it."
He brought from the same cupboard a shot-pouch of beaded deerskin and
a powder-horn, ornamented with dull silver that would not catch the
light. Also a belt of hide from which there hung in sheaths a
delicately balanced hatchet and a long, broad-bladed knife.
"These you will discover no less useful than the gun," he explained,
drawing the weapons from their coverings. "This which you call a
hatchet is the tomahawk of the Indians, used for fighting at close
quarters and for throwing. This other is the scalping-knife, and a
deadly blade it is, too. You will feel them strange at first, but
among my friends in New York there is a Dutchman named Corlaer who
will instruct you in the ways of the wilderness."
"You will not be letting Master Harry go upon his adventures without
smoothing the path for him, will you, Robert?" interposed granny,
looking up from the work-table by which she sat.
"No, indeed; he shall have letters to Governor Burnet himself, whom I
met before he went overseas, and to Master Cadwalader Colden, the
Governor's surveyor-general and a member of his Council, a fine,
loyal gentleman with whom I have had some correspondence. They will
see to him, more especially because he brings news of value to their
plans; and he may be used to thwart the intrigues they struggle
against."
V