"Don't I know that? He isn't looking for anybody. There they come," he added, when the two resumed their walk and came up to the shore end of the gangplank. "Well, what do you think of it? We sent the bullets around her pretty lively, did we not?"
The two boys did not say anything. They had probably come down there to use their eyes and not their tongues, and in that way escaped getting into argument with Enoch and Caleb which they were sure would end in something else. They looked all around the schooner and up at her sails, and finally having seen enough turned to go away; but Caleb who was watching them told them to wait a minute.
"James, I want you to remember that you put me in trouble through that tongue of yours, and that I shall bear it in mind," said he. "The only thing that saves you now is my being on guard on board this vessel."
James waited until he thought Caleb was through, and then hurried away without making any reply, and they blessed their lucky stars that they had got off so easily; but there was a threat contained under Caleb's last words which rankled uneasily in James's mind.
"I guess my father's way is the best," said the latter. "Will you come, too?"
"I hope so," replied Emerson. "It is a beautiful thing to give up to the rebels, that place of ours, but it won't be forever. They will soon be whipped and then we can come back."
The boys waited a long time for the rest of their friends to get through with their supper and come back to the wharf, and then they saw that Captain O'Brien had something on his mind, for he was going first to one man and then to another and having a talk with each. They were all in favor of it, too, for each one shook the captain's hand and patted him on the back as if they wanted to go at it right away. Zeke appeared at last, and he was wild over what the captain said to him. He pulled off his hat—he had been home and got another one by this time—and swung it around his head, but he did not hurrah until he was red in the face as he usually did. He seemed to take his enthusiasm out in the violence of his motions. Then he put his hat on his head and walked briskly toward the schooner.
"Now, boys," said he as he came up the gangplank.
"Say, Zeke, what was it that the captain had to say to you?" asked Caleb. "It must have been something patriotic, for you swung your hat and never hurrahed at all."
"Enoch, you jump down there and cast off the bow and stern lines," said Zeke, looking all around as if to see what else ought to be done. "Caleb, you go round on the wharf and find a small boat that you think will do to pull the boat out to her moorings. I will go to the wheel, and when all that is done I will tell you what the captain said to me."