CHAPTER VIII.

CHAPTER VIII.

First Blood.

“Cockburn is coming!” This was the news that was borne from lip to lip, and Lettice was made to repeat her experience over and over. It must be said that she did rather needlessly enlarge upon the terrors of the occasion when Lutie was the listener, and the eyes of that sable maiden grew bigger and bigger as Lettice described Admiral Cockburn’s appearance: a great big man, as tall as a locust tree, with fiery red hair and blazing eyes and a long beard that blew out like the tail of a comet; so he appeared to Lutie’s vision, her imagination adding hoofs and horns; and he became the theme of Jubal’s perorations, taking the place of “Poly Bonypart” as a bugaboo to scare the children and the more timid girls. And not without reason; for a terrifying account of a raid upon Havre-de-Grâce and other towns in the upper Chesapeake was cause enough for alarm.

It was Birket Dean who came galloping over withnews: “Cockburn, with a big force of men, has been playing havoc up in Kent and Cecil counties, and even beyond. Havre-de-Grâce has suffered; every one has been plundered, and the ravagers weren’t satisfied with that, but went up the Sassafras and destroyed Fredericktown and Georgetown. They say that the women pleaded and begged that he would spare their homes, but he refused, and the houses were burned to the ground; and he says he’ll not be satisfied till he has burned every building in Baltimore.”

“Oh, does he mean to go there next?” Lettice asked in excitement.

“They say he doubtless did intend to, but he has heard through his friends among the Peace men that the lookout boats are stationed all the way down thePatapsco, and that there are videttes along the shores of the bay and the river, and besides, the City Brigade will be ready for them. They fired alarm guns in Baltimore and had all the troops out, but the redcoats passed by Annapolis and Baltimore and went to the upper bay. A great many people moved out of the city, I am told.”

“Do you suppose there can really be any danger of their coming here?” Betty asked, holding her baby very closely.

The men looked at each other and were silent, then William, caressing the top of his little son’s silky head, said, “If they do, we’ll defend our homes to the last drop of blood.”

“And you’ll not leave us, William?” said Betty, scanning his face eagerly.

“My place is near home, I have determined,” he replied, smiling down at her.

The next few days brought tales of further marauding; tales of such horror that Betty and Lettice clung to each other in terror. And, indeed, the atrocities committed were such that in some places the word “Hampton” was used instead of “Attention” to call the men to order, and the accounts of the terrible ravages lessened greatly the number of those who opposed the war.

But as days went by and no Cockburn appeared, the fears even of those most easily frightened were quelled, and affairs went on as usual.

“It’s desperately tiresome, this staying at home,” Lettice said to her brother James. “I don’t mean to do it any longer. Would there be any harm, do you think, in our going out for a wee bit of a way on the water? We know full well that the British are away down the bay, andI haven’t had a sail this many a day. Do take me out, Jamie, or I’ll go alone.” It was a lovely morning in July, somewhat warm, and promising greater heat. Lettice sat discontentedly on the lower step of the porch, looking off toward the creek.

“You’ll not go alone,” said James, swinging his long legs over the railing of the porch, and sitting down beside her.

“Then you’ll take me.”

“Yes; there’s not a sail in sight, and I reckon we’ll have it all to ourselves, besides—”

“Besides what?”

“I think I’d like to be at Queenstown when the boat comes in.”

Lettice turned and looked at him. “Why? You have a reason. I see it in your eyes.”

“So I have.” He took a letter from his pocket and held it off at a little distance. Lettice made a grab for it, but he caught her hand, and laughing, held her firmly. “It isn’t for you,” he said.

“Whose is it, then?”

“Mine.”

“Let me see the handwriting. Please do, Jamie.”

He held the letter at a careful distance, andshe read the address in Rhoda’s neat hand: Mr. James Hopkins. “From Rhoda! Oh, is she coming down on the packet?”

“Yes, so the letter says, and will I meet her and Aunt Martha. It seems that Aunt Martha has been ill, and the city is hot, so she thinks she may venture down to this neighborhood; unwisely, I think, with the enemy so near and ready to pounce on us at any moment.”

“Now, James, quit talking so to scare me. And where is Rhoda’s devoted cavalier, that she must call on you for an escort?”

“I do not know where he is; her father has gone to Philadelphia, and probably the young man is there too; they seem to travel in company.”

“I wonder if they went on the new steamboat. I should think they would go that way; such a novelty as it is.”

“Perhaps they did; Rhoda does not say.”

“Well come, then; if we are to meet the packet, we ought to be off. I hope there will be news from father. It seems a long time between letters, and so very long since we have seen him. I think I will take Lutie along with me, and we can stay all night at Sylvia’s Ramble. I’ll run in while you get the boat ready and tell Sister Betty that weare going.”

“Don’t go, Letty,” Betty advised. “Suppose you should encounter the British.”

“We’ll not, I am sure; they are away off down the bay, and we’ll not go far.”

“Well, I wish you wouldn’t go at all. James ought to have more sense than to take you.”

“He had to, because I told him I’d go alone if he didn’t.”

“Sauce-box! you’d do no such thing.”

“Wouldn’t I?”

“Lettice, you wouldn’t. Don’t you ever dare to do such a thing. Remember Hampton.”

Lettice looked suddenly grave. “I reckon I’d better not go alone,” she said, as she turned away.

“It is such a lovely afternoon for a sail,” she remarked, as she settled herself in the boat. “You don’t expect to shoot any game, do you, Jamie? What’s the gun for?”

“For defence, if need be, and this pistol, too.” He laid it down by the side of the gun.

Lutie put both hands to her ears. “Law, Mars Jeems, yuh ain’t gwine in de way o’ dem Britishers, is yuh?” she asked in terror.

“I’m not going to get in their way if I can help it, but they may get in ours. I think, afterall, Lettice, you and Lutie had best go back.”

“Not I!” Lettice returned. “I’m here, and here I’ll stay, Britisher or no Britisher. I don’t mean to have you go alone; besides, Aunt Martha is not well, and I ought to go over as soon as I can, she might need me.”

“Rhoda said they might need me, not you.”

“How self-satisfied some one is all of a sudden! I say they may need me. Now, push off; there’s no use parleying. I’ll jump in and swim there if you don’t hurry.”

“I believe you are capable of it,” Jamie returned.

“Of course I am. I am sure the packet would not be running if there were any danger, and you told me, yourself, that none of the enemy had been seen around here.”

“I know I did; I would bear you back to the house by force if I thought there would be any danger for you. At all events, we’ll trust to luck, and get over to the landing as quickly as possible.”

“We’ve plenty of time, haven’t we?”

“Yes.”

“Then do let us stop at Betty’s cove. Mrs. Cooke promised me a plant, and I’ve long wanted a chance to get it.”

James consented, and before long they were turninginto a little creek which lay back of Mr. Cooke’s property. The boat, however, hardly touched her moorings before a shout was heard, and two men started up from behind some bushes, crying: “Halt there! We’ve got you, have we, you foul deserter!”

James, who had scarce set foot on shore, turned and dealt the man about to grab him a heavy blow; but before he could regain his footing upon the boat, the second man gave a shout, and a couple of others came running from a small boathouse near by. The first seized James and dragged him off, despite his manful resistance.

For a moment Lettice was nearly paralyzed with fright, then she recovered her wits, and, grabbing the gun, she pointed it at James’s assailant. The gun was heavy, and her hands trembled with the weight of it. Suppose she should shoot wildly and kill her brother. With a swift, silent prayer that James might be spared, she took aim, fired, and dropped the gun. “Hand me the pistol,” she cried to Lutie. “Run, Jamie, now’s your chance!” she shouted, for one of the men holding James, being wounded in the shoulder by the shot Lettice had fired, had dropped his prisoner’s arm; and James, with a wrench, tore himself from the remaining hold upon him.

“Come on,” she yelled.

“Come on,” she yelled.

He had too often shared in the athletic sports common upon holidays not to be a good runner, and he was but an instant in reaching the edge of the water; dashing in, he swam around to the other side of the vessel, which was slowly drifting farther and farther out, Lettice meanwhile standing resolutely pointing her pistol at his pursuers. “Lutie,” she cried, without turning her head, “pick up that axe, and if any one dares to touch this boat, brain him. You hear me?”

Lutie, though quaking with fear, gained courage from the attitude of her young mistress and picked up the axe. “Come on,” she yelled. “Come on, yuh po’ white trash, yuh! Jes’ lemme ketch one o’ yuh techin’ mah young mistis, an’ I’ll lay dis axe ’bout yo neck lak yuh was a chicken fo’ brilin’. Yuh ole good-fo’-nothin’ tu’key buzza’ds, yuh!” She stood with axe raised, and the two defenders of the little vessel did present such a formidable aspect that the men fell back. Only one or two were prepared to fire. They had been disturbed in the taking of an afternoon nap, and had previously divested themselves of all superfluous accoutrements. Therefore, though one or two bullets whizzed across the bows of the vessel as she retreated, not one touched the occupants.

Slowly, farther and farther out the little craftfloated, and finally James, who had scrambled aboard, was setting sail for the opposite shore, and told Lettice they were beyond danger. “I feel like a cowardly wretch,” he said, “to run from the foe at the very moment you needed me for defence. What would have happened to us all, but for my brave little sister?”

And then Lettice sank down and began to cry hysterically, thus demanding Lutie’s administrations; and for some time the maid found herself fully occupied in soothing her young mistis. “Law, Miss Letty, yuh is safe,” she repeated. “Huccome yuh cry when ’taint nobody daid?”

“I want to go home, I want to go home! Jamie, take me home!” Lettice wailed.

“I will, sis. We are getting there as fast as we can. Don’t you see we have turned about and are going back?”

“And you won’t go to meet the packet? Say you won’t.”

“Never mind about that now. If I do go, it will be on horseback, and I will go around by the road; so you needn’t worry about that.”

“I don’t want you to go,” Lettice persisted. “I don’t want you out of my sight.”

James laughed. “You’re funny, sis. I can’t help laughing at you. A minute ago you were so fierce and valiant, and now you’re weeping and going on like a baby.”

“But you’re all wet,” sobbed Lettice.

“Suppose I am? That’s nothing; and on a hot afternoon, too. I have often been as wet as this when I’ve been out ducking, and when it was a good bit colder. Come, sit up here and help me. We shall have to tack across, for the wind has died down.”

“You are sure you are not hurt at all?” said Lettice, drying her eyes.

“No, not a bit. I look rather the worse for wear, that is all.”

“It was so awful to see them dragging you off,” and Lettice burst into tears again.

“They didn’t drag me very far, did they? Thanks to my little soldier girl of a sister. There, honey, don’t cry any more; we’re nearly home.” And he hugged and petted her till, by the time they reached their own landing, she had somewhat calmed down. But as James led her up the steps to her sister Betty, she lapsed again into a woful state, and it required the combined efforts of Mammy, Dorcas, Lutie, and Betty to quiet her; for one minute she would burst into wild laughteras she looked at Lutie, and would say, “She looked so funny standing there threatening to chop off their heads like chickens,” and then she would fall to weeping because it was so awful to see them dragging off her brother. At last, under the combined effects of red lavender, salts, and finally a mint-julep, she fell asleep. “I don’t trust you off this place again without me,” said Betty, bending over the exhausted little figure and kissing the white forehead around which damp curls clustered. And with Mammy to fan her on one side, and Lutie on the other, she was left in the quiet of her own room.

James hurried off his wet clothes, donned another suit, and springing upon his horse, galloped across country to the landing, arriving just in time to see the packet come in, and to welcome his aunt and Rhoda. A flush mounted to his face when he saw in attendance Mr. Robert Clinton. “I don’t see what they needed me for,” he muttered.

“Mr. Clinton surprised us by arriving from Philadelphia last night,” Rhoda told him. “My father was not willing that I should come down here, he sent word.”

“But you came. Why?”

“Because it is my duty to remain with my aunt, and I cannot let my personal convenience stand in the way of duty,” replied Rhoda, a little primly.

“And Mr. Clinton came because it was his duty, or because you did, which?” said James, in a vexed tone.

“My father would have it so. When he learned that I intended to remain with Aunt Martha, he said that he should prefer that we have the protection of either Mr. Clinton or himself, and since his affairs did not permit of his presence here just now, he sent Mr. Clinton.”

“I see.” James looked at her fixedly, and she looked down, blushing faintly.

“Where is Lettice?” she asked, to turn the subject. James told her of their late experience.

Rhoda shivered. “Is it as bad as that?” she asked.

“Yes, and may be worse. I wish you had not come down.”

Rhoda bit her lip. “Aunt Martha insisted,” she murmured.

“Unwisely, I think. I should advise that you return at once.”

Rhoda shook her head. “I will stay as long as Aunt Martha does. She will need me.”

“But you will persuade her that there is danger?”

“I will try.”

But Aunt Martha, once she took a decision, was not to be moved, and she refused utterly to return to the city, saying that her husband’s interests demanded her presence on the plantation, and she felt it her duty to remain at all hazards. “The place will go to rack and ruin while he is away, if I don’t look out for it,” she declared, “and I cannot neglect my husband’s affairs when he is away. I am willing to take the risks, for I think my presence may be a saving means for us all, in case of a visit from those bands of foragers.”

And therefore Lettice heard with mixed feelings that her uncle’s home was likely to hold for some time, not only her aunt and Rhoda, but Robert Clinton.

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