At this moment Darius and the commodore's cook came on deck, each bearing in his arms a certain amount of cooked food, and this the old sailor threw without care into the bottom of the new canoe, himself following with the utmost haste.
"Come on, lads, if you count on gettin' any sleep this night," he cried impatiently as he took up one of the paddles.
"Are we to go without weapons?" I asked.
"We shan't need them. If we meet the Britishers it will be in such force that half a dozen of the best rifles ever made would do us no good, and there will be none others on the river with whom we shall want to interfere."
"But we might run across Elias Macomber," I urged, not minded to go empty-handed on such a perilous voyage.
"It is too late to fool around with spies now," Darius said sharply. "They've done us all the mischief possible, an' it's a case of standin' before an open enemy."
I had no desire to argue further within hearing of the commodore, and scrambled down into the boat, where my comrades were seated ready to begin the voyage.
Now indeed was Darius the leader of the party, and after the conversation in regard to the muskets, I was prepared to obey him without a murmur.
It is a large canoe which will carry six people comfortably, without sign of being overloaded, yet the boat we were in did it, and I would not have hesitated to put in a couple more had it been necessary, while she paddled as easily as a craft half her size.
"It's a great little boat," Darius said approvingly as we began the voyage with a burst of speed which absolutely surprised me. "I reckon we could show our heels to the best that can be found on the river."