“Heavens!” cried Mrs. Willmington, “and was it not then a spirit?” she asked.
“He looked more like a paniole than a pirit, ma’am,” said the individual who gave the information, who was the chief servant in the house, and whose especial destiny it had been to be gagged and otherwise dealt with in his pantry, wherein he was at the moment busy about some particulars connected with his avocation.
“Run up stairs. Go you, Edward, to—to—Mr. ——, the magistrate; alarm the town; tell the soldiers at the fort,” exclaimed Mrs. Willmington, while she herself rushed up-stairs with a servant.
Young Willmington was found duly gagged and tied in the favourite style of the pirates. He was immediately released, and he got up from the bed on which the kind consideration of the unwelcome visitors had laid him. He exhibited less pleasure at his freedom than one would have expected to see.
“What is the matter with you, James?” said Mrs. Willmington, not a little surprised at the strange calmness of her son. “Do you know that your father has been carried away from his house?”
“Yes, mother, I know it.”
“Then why not make more haste, James, and go to see about it?” rejoined Mrs. Willmington.
No answer.
“I shall go,” said young Willmington, after a pause, “but my mind misgives me about this whole affair. My father ought not to have concealed the truth from us. The man who came into the house, last night, is my brother.”