“You’re the right grit, lad, and if I don’t show you a few English flags, the day after to-morrow, it’s because Molly Stark will be a widow.”
The door opened, and in clamped a big country blacksmith, with his basket of tools, while his blue coat, brass scales, and tall hat-plume showed that he had just come in from “training.”
“Hang it, Zeke, we don’t want to shoe a horse here,” said Stark, grinning. “This gentleman has been unfortunate enough to fall into British hands, and they’ve ornamented him with bracelets. File them off, so he can dine with me.”
“That’s me, Gineral,” said the smith, affably. “Ef I don’t hev them irons off in five minutes, you kin take my hat.”
He was as good as his word, filing away at the irons with great vigor, and when the tavern waiter entered with a large tray, some five minutes later, Adrian Schuyler was rubbing his released wrists with a sense of gratitude, while the smith, who had been cheerfully whistling over his task, and replying affably to his General’s dry jokes, had just picked up his basket to leave.
Adrian Schuyler, who was used to the formal discipline of the great Frederick’s army, was wonderfully amused at the free and easy ways of the General of militia, who behaved like an easy-going old father among his uncouth soldiers. He had yet to learn that in that singular man, John Stark, were concentrated the only qualities that enable a man to drive up raw militia to the cannon’s mouth, with the steadiness of veterans.
CHAPTER XI.
THE MOUNTAIN QUEEN’S WARNING.
The rain poured steadily down in torrents, and the heavens were all one unvarying mass of leaden clouds. The outlines of the Green Mountains were wrapped in driving fleeces of gray mist, and the chilly north-east wind drove the rain aslant, splashing up the pools that collected in every hollow.
Adrian Schuyler, at the head of a small party of horsemen, was slowly riding along on his recovered charger, through the fields near the little town of Bennington. He was wrapped in his long cloak, and the rain dripped from his tall hussar-cap in a continued spout. His followers were awkward, countryfied Green-Mountain Boys, but their peculiar leathern costume told that they were all hunters, and not agriculturists, by profession. Hunters they were, and first-class shots, keen at detecting trails, and model scouts.