"Make all ready, sir," replied the Captain. Then turning to the minister, "There is no particular hurry, Master Mather. You can take the night to think over it. To-morrow morning probably, if you come to your senses, we may be able to send you ashore somewhere, between here and the capes of the Delaware."
"This is outrageous!" said Master Mather. "I will hold both of you accountable for it."
"It is a bad time to threaten, when your head is in the lion's mouth, Master Mather," returned Captain Tolley fiercely. "No one knows but my own men that you ever came on board the 'Storm King.' How do you know that I am not Captain Kidd himself?"
The minister's face grew pale. It was no disparagement to his manhood. Even Master Raymond's face grew very serious—for did even he know that this Captain Tolley might not be the renowned freebooter, of whose many acts of daring and violence the wide seas rang?
"I would counsel you for your own good to do at once what you will have to do ultimately," said Master Raymond gravely. "I owe you no thanks for anything; but"—and the young man laughed as he turned to Dulcibel—"I never could trap even a fox without pitying the animal."
Dulcibel went up to the minister, and put her hand upon his arm:—"Do I look so much like a witch?" she said in a playful tone.
"We are told that Satan can enrobe himself like an angel of light," replied Master Mather severely. "I judge you by what I have heard of your cruel deeds."
"As you judged the cruel yellow bird that turned out to be only a harmless little chicken," said Master Raymond sarcastically. "Enough of this folly. Will you marry us now—or not? If you will, you shall be put ashore unharmed. If you will not, you shall go along with us. Make up your mind at once, for we shall soon be out of Boston harbor."
Master Mather had a strong will—and an equally strong won't—but the Philistines were, for this time, too much for him. That reference to Captain Kidd had frightened him badly. "Stand up—and I will marry you. Unscrupulous as you both are, it is better that you should be married by legal rites, than allowed to go your own way to destruction."
And then—the important ceremony being duly gone through—he pronounced Master Ellis Raymond and Mistress Dulcibel Burton man and wife. The Captain being allowed by Master Raymond to take the first kiss, as acting in the place of the bride's father.