"And what was his mood when he gave it to you?"
"Why, it was what you might call the Madeira mood--his old accustomed temper. He had the hiccoughs, I recall, when he spoke with me. Most generally he does have them. Yet, speak the truth and shame the devil! he is sober two days to that Colonel Sillinger's one. If their expedition fails, it won't be for want of rum. They had twenty barrels when they started from La Chine, and it went to my heart to see men make such beasts of themselves."
I could not but smile at this. "The last time I saw you before to-day," I said, "there could not well have been less than a quart of rum inside of you."
"No doubt! But it is quite another thing to guzzle while your work is still in hand. That I never would do. And it is that which makes me doubt these British will win, in the long-run. Rum is good to rest upon--it is rest itself--when the labor is done; but it is ruin to drink it when your task is still ahead of you. To tell the truth, I could not bear to see these fellows drink, drink, drink, all day long, with all their hard fighting to come. It made me uneasy."
"And is it your purpose to join us? We are the sober ones, you know."
"Well, yes and no. I don't mind giving your side a lift--it's more my way of thinking than the other--and you seem to need it powerfully, too. But"--here he looked critically over my blue and buff, from cockade to boot-tops--"you don't get any uniform on me, and I don't join any regiment. I'd take my chance in the woods first. It suits you to a 't,' but it would gag me from the first minute."
We talked thus until we reached the Cedars. I left Enoch and the escort without, and knocked at the door. I had to rap a second time before Molly Wemple appeared to let me in.
"We were all up-stairs," she said, wiping her hot and dusty brow with her apron, "hard at it! I'll send her down to you. She needs a little breathing-spell."
The girl was gone before I could ask what extra necessity for labor had fallen upon the household this sultry summer afternoon.
Daisy came hurriedly to me, a moment later, and took both my hands in hers. She also bore signs of work and weariness.