“I came to enlist,” said Dennis.
“You will be wanted,” said Mr. Putnam. “You have shoulders as broad as Atlas, who carried the world on his back.”
“The world on his back? What did he walk upon?”
“That is a question too much,” said the rider. “I’ll leave my horse in your hands, Dennis O’Hay, and go to the tavern and see what I can find out about the Governor’s movements there.”
He strode across the green.
The sun was going down, sending up red and golden lances, as it were, over the dark shades of the cedars. On the hills lay great farms half in glittering sunlight, half in dark shadows.
“Have you any thought when the Governor will return?” asked the rider of the tavern-keeper.
“No, Israel, I have not—but I hear that there is important news from Boston—that it is suspected that the British are about to make a move to capture the stores of American powder at Concord. The Governor, I mind me, knows something about the secrets of powder hiding, but of that I can not be sure.”
“Great events are at hand,” said Putnam. “I can feel them in the air. I had the same feeling before the northern campaign. I must stay here until the Governor arrives.”