DUTY.

"How strange it seems here," said Nancy Foster leaning forward toward

Elizabeth, as they sat in the sunshine on the deck of the schooner; and

as she spoke she glanced along the horizon.

Elizabeth before answering turned her head in the direction in which the

land, had it been in sight, would have appeared; but no vision of shore

broke the wide circuit of ocean and sky. Then her eyes came back to the

little vessel as if to assure herself that she was not alone in this

waste of water. Her father sat on the opposite side reading. With a word

of reply to Nancy, she fell into silence again. Only, instead of the

vague wonder how she should meet the future, her thoughts now turned to

the past. It was nine mornings since that consultation with her father

in the library, and they had been only one night at sea. It had taken a

week to get off. From the first she had counted upon Mrs. Eveleigh's

remonstrances and vehement reproaches of Mr. Royal's wrong-doing in

taking his daughter into such danger. They were only a little more

vehement than she had expected. But Mrs. Eveleigh did not know the

errand; if she had, that would have made a difference, or, as Elizabeth

reflected, she thought that this would have been treated as the

strangest part of the affair. But she had kept her own counsel, saying

only that her father and she thought it right. Mrs. Eveleigh had been so

exasperated by being kept in the dark that she had retained her anger to

the very last day. Then she had drowned her resentment in a flood of

tears, and declared between her sobs that, frightful as it all was, for

she dreaded the very sight of a gun, she would rather go with Elizabeth

than have the dear girl set off without any companion. Elizabeth's

reminder that her father and Nancy were to accompany her only called

forth the assertion that a maid was no companion, and a man was nothing

at such a time. Elizabeth thought that at the time of sieges and battles

a man might be considered of some little consequence. But she never

argued with Mrs. Eveleigh, and she had quitted her thankful for the good

lady's affection, and glad that Mrs. Eveleigh was to be left behind on

such an expedition.

"You'll never come back," Mrs. Eveleigh sobbed. "The French ships of war

will be sure to gobble up you and your father, too. I know just how it

will be. You are a crazy girl, and I don't know what is the matter with

you," she had added irrelevantly; "and as to your father, you must have

bewitched him; he used to have plenty of common sense."

The matter with Mr. Royal was, that he knew his daughter well enough to

be sure that if Archdale was killed during the siege she would feel

always that her silence might have given the opportunity for his death.

And he knew that to bring upon Elizabeth the miseries of an uneasy

conscience would be to kill her by slow torture. Besides, he himself

believed in the danger, his own conscience was aroused, and that was not

easily put to sleep. But if he had heard the verdict of Mrs. Eveleigh,

who knew nothing of the matter, he would not have blamed her so much.

He had hired this little schooner in which they now were at a ruinous

rate, and had not been able to do even that until he had pledged himself

to pay all damages in case of loss. Governor Shirley had seized the

opportunity to send dispatches several days earlier than he had

intended. Mr. Royal went with a picked crew, men both honest and

skilful. He knew the dangers of French vessels as well as Mrs. Eveleigh

did, but his daughter's persistent assertion: "We shall be murderers,"

had overborne every objection.

Elizabeth sitting on deck that morning, was thinking of these things,

and tracing in this danger which she was trying to avert, one of the

consequences of her frolic on the river that summer evening. Then she

remembered that but for that she would perhaps have been Edmonson's

wife, and she said to herself that the Lord had been very merciful to

her, and that she would try not to shrink from her duty.

"How fast we are going," said Nancy again. It was true that the little

vessel before a fair wind was flying over the water at a rate that, if

kept up, and in the same direction, would soon bring its passengers to

their destination. Elizabeth was glad of speed, already it might be too

late. And besides, the sooner her errand was done, the sooner she should

return with a mind at rest. She began to reckon how long before she

should be at home again. In a week, in less time if they were fortunate,

they should reach Louisburg. She should not want more than five minutes'

talk with Mr. Archdale. Then it would be home again immediately. Her

father had hired the schooner for the very reason that it should not be

detailed for any other service, but should bring them back at once.

How strange it was, she thought, to spend fourteen days for only five

minutes' conversation, and that, too, with one who was no especial

friend except through his engagement to Katie. But for all the weariness

she was thankful to do it, and grateful to her father. She hoped that

she should not catch even a glimpse of Edmonson, and it seemed

improbable that she would. After the siege was over he would probably go

to England again. How she wished he were there now, and she quietly at

home, where in that case she might have been now.

The next day there was a head wind, and the day following no wind at

all. As time went on, it grew evident that it would be more than a week

from their starting before they could drop anchor in Cabanus Bay. Dread

lest they should be too late began to harass Elizabeth. But she showed

no impatience. Her silence was what Nancy noticed most. But, then, Nancy

liked talking, and did not enjoy the books which her Mistress had

brought with her and read most persistently, or sometimes tried to read,

unsuccessfully. Even then they served as a protection against the maid's

talk when she was in too anxious a mood to endure it.

On the morning of the seventeenth they caught sight of the "Little

Gibraltar," but the wind was against them, and it was the afternoon of

the next day before the Captain of the schooner could run into the Bay,

and go ashore with his dispatches and Mistress Royal's message to the

General.

Elizabeth looked about her with breathless interest, realizing that here

she was to find war. It happened that on her arrival there was a lull in

the cannonading. Both sides had paused to draw breath, but the lull was

far from perfect silence, and to her inexperience this occasional

thunder of bursting shells seemed sharp conflict. She said so to the

Captain as they drew toward shore.

"Bless yer!" he answered with a laugh. "This ain' t no thin' at all,

this is nothin' but child's play. Wait till yer see it hot and heavy. I

s'pose we shall go back to-morrow, though. I'd like to have yer see some

good stout work first."

"Ain't we in danger here?" inquired Nancy.

The skipper rolled his quid of tobacco in his cheek reflectively a

moment. "Well, no," he said, "I guess nothin' to speak of. They're too

busy answering the batteries; it's only the stray shot that comes our

way. There's a thousand chances to one agin' its hitting us, and I guess

we can stand the one." He looked at Nancy closely to guage the amount of

her courage.

"I guess we can," she answered coolly. This reply seemed to please him.

He had before considered Nancy "a nice lookin' girl;" and now, as he put

down "grit" in his mental catalogue of her fascinations, he smiled to

himself, and thought of a neat little home on the Salem shore where his

mother now presided, and where it was not impossible that some day Nancy

might be persuaded to reign. But the demands of the hour recalled him

from this dream to his usual brisk attention to realities, and as soon

as he had cast anchor, he left the ship in charge of the mate, and went

in search of the General.

General Pepperell was in his tent, resting after a hard day's work. Not

only had he been through the camp cheering the soldiers, by imparting

to them something of his own indomitable resolution and by seeing

personally that everything possible was done for the sufferers in the

hospital, but he had also been for hours superintending the arrangements

on the new battery that was to do such execution upon the granite walls

of Louisburg. Now everything was in readiness and he had ordered two

hours of rest before the firing from it should begin. Nearly an hour of

that had gone by before he entered his tent for the rest he needed, when

almost immediately the messenger reached him.

"Mr. Royal and his daughter here!" he cried. "And Mr. Royal requests

to see Captain Archdale? I don't understand. But I shall hear why

from them." He dispatched an orderly for Stephen who was still at the

battery, and then went with the skipper to the little vessel that had

brought the unexpected guests. Elizabeth never forgot the kindness of

his greeting. In the midst of the strange scene and of preparations for

work in which women had no part, the friendliness of his face and tones,

and his cordial grasp of her hand made her feel almost at home. She had

been sure of courtesy, but she had not dared to look for this, and her

eyes grew dim for an instant.

"I suppose that we shall return this evening," she said after the

greetings and inquiries were over and Mr. Royal had explained that in

a few minutes all that he had come for could be said to Mr. Archdale.

Although after thinking the matter over carefully he had decided that it

was Elizabeth, filled with the spirit of her warning, who should herself

give her message to Archdale yet he spoke to Pepperell as if she had

accompanied him. And when the General said that he had already sent for

the young man, Mr. Royal told him that his daughter had that in her

pocket for him which, if he knew, it would lend wings to his feet.

"A letter from our charming Mistress Katie," pronounced Pepperell,

smiling at Elizabeth.

"Yes," she said, and after a little repeated her question of their

returning that evening.

"Yes, I know," said the General. He waited a moment, and then added.

"But if you come among soldiers, you will feel the exactions of war.

There are those dispatches, you remember, not even read yet" and he

touched the breast of his coat, "because I was in such haste to pay my

respects to you. Now, I should like to send an answer to these, and I am

afraid I shall not have it ready before to-morrow morning; the Commodore

will probably write me to-night and I want to include whatever news he

may have. Will to-morrow do?"

"Oh, yes, I shall be glad to help the cause, even so little as that,"

she answered. Pepperell thanked her for her words, and ignored the look

of disappointment that he had seen flit across her face before she

spoke.

"We have been putting up a fascine battery within two hundred and

fifteen yards of the west gate," he said, "It will open fire in an hour,

and then you will see a cannonade! We have two forty-two pounders there,

it will be no child's play." Nothing had then hinted at the Titanic

scale of modern war engines. Elizabeth's eyes dilated, but she said

nothing. The General sat beside her, and asked how things were going on

in Boston, asked about his friends, and many trifling details that

neither dispatches nor letters would give him, and that she wondered

that he had heart for in the scenes going on about him. Then he told

them many particulars of the siege and especially of the terrible labor

of dragging the heavy guns from the shore into position, interspersing

all this narrative of the life-and-death struggles with amusing

anecdotes and bright comments, until she was amazed, and in listening

found that she had gained a better knowledge of him than in years of

ordinary acquaintance. For she could not have realized by that how

many-sided the man was, how full of resources, and how indomitable.

She noticed how sympathetically he spoke of the brave fellows he was

leading. When he said that the hardships of the campaign and the cold

of a severer climate than they had been accustomed to had prostrated

numbers of them. Elizabeth saw that it was not only soldiers that he

felt he was losing when they died, but men from his own home and

neighborhood and in whom he had a personal interest. Then as he sat

there, she begged him not to think of her if others needed him but

to go.

"This time is at my own disposal," he answered, adding with a smile. "If

the struggle had come, Mistress Royal, I should think of you, no doubt,

but I should not give you a moment's attention. The pointing of the

smallest cannon would at the moment be of more importance than all your

affairs. A besieging army can have no cry of '_Place aux dames_;'

therefore I shall not invite you to stay after to-morrow. I shall even

send you home. Or, lest I should hurt your feelings too much, I will put

it this way; I shall send your father home, and he will take you with

him."

Elizabeth laughed; and the conversation went on with its interest

increasing, when all at once Pepperell rose, and held out his hand to

her in farewell. "I may not see you again until we meet in Boston." he

said, "but if I can, I will come for a moment in the morning."

She was surprised at his going away so soon after his assurance of being

at leisure but as after speaking to her father he stepped over the side

of the vessel, she perceived the reason for his sudden departure. His

trained eye had caught what the distance had hidden from her, the figure

of a man coming rapidly toward the shore.

When the General landed, the keel of the little boat he was in grated on

the beach at Stephen Archdale's feet. With a salute to his commander,

the latter sprang into it, and before Elizabeth had recovered her

breath, was coming over the ship's side.

The General walked on without turning his head toward the schooner.

Nevertheless, it is true that once he said to himself distinctly. "The

Yankee in me does clamor to know what they want of that fellow."

[Footnote 1: Copyright, 1884, by Frances C. Sparhawk.]

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