“The sheriff hath him,” Peggy told him chokingly. “Sally took him home with her last night, and I went there to see him this afternoon. I met the sheriff in Fourth Street as I left here, and he must have followed me; for I had scarce begun to talk to Clifford when he came and took my cousin. He talks of an indictment.”
Both girls were crying by this time, and with an exclamation of concern Mrs. Owen hastened to them, and drew them into an embrace.
“There! There!” she said soothingly. “David will manage it somehow. Don’t sob so, Sally. After all thee is not so much to blame. Perchance the Council will excuse what thee did, as ’twas to help Peggy.”
“I don’t care for the old Council,” flashed Sally through her tears. “’Tis that Peggy’s cousin thinks that I betrayed him. I thought he was up attic, and he wasn’t. I told Peggy to tell him to go there, but she did not hear me. Thee knows my fault, Mrs. Owen,” she wailed in an agony of self-reproach. “Thee knows just how froward and saucy I can be, and I was just that way with the sheriff, and—and pert. He spoke of the closet, showing that he knew of it, and I was so sure that Clifford was up attic that I asked the sheriff if I should open the door for him. I did, and there was Clifford,” she ended with a fresh burst of tears.
“I know just how you feel,” interposed Nurse Johnson sympathetically. “And so the prisoner was Clifford? Well, I am sorry that he was taken. Tell us all about it, Peggy.”
“Yes, lass,” spoke David Owen. “Calm thyself as soon as may be, and let me know the matter in detail. I must know all concerning it.”
Mr. Owen spoke gravely. Well he knew what the feeling was toward those who assisted prisoners of war in escaping. Aiding or abetting the enemy in any way was not tolerated, either in the city or the country at large. The systematic cruelties practiced toward the American prisoners both in the dreadful prison ships and the jails, the barbarities perpetrated toward their countrymen in the South, the harassing of the coasts, the raids of the refugees, the capture of their merchantmen by British privateers; all these things and many others served to keep the hearts of Americans inflamed with rancor toward the English. They were not disposed to overlook any indulgence displayed toward such an enemy.
Presently Peggy had so far recovered her usual composure that she was able to relate succinctly all that had occurred. Her father listened attentively.
“Why did thee not come to me for aid, lass?” he asked when she had finished the recital.