“Good night, my boy,” said the Widow Stubbs in her calm way. “Be sure you act like a boy of sense.”
“I will,” answered Dicky sturdily as he made for the door.
The night was murky, and as Dick glanced out upon the dark bosom of the bay he could only tell the position of the British ships by the lights twinkling dimly at their mastheads, while the huge bulk of their black hulls made only a deeper shadow in the half-darkness. Dicky trudged along the straggling streets of the town and presently he found himself in a country lane that led toward the Overing House, a comfortable old tavern convenient to the cantonments of the troops, and where General Prescott had established himself temporarily.
The house was not fully alight, as people went to bed earlier in those days and ten o’clock was considered quite late. The kitchen where the host and his humble friends gathered was perfectly dark, but in the northwest corner of the house a light still burned. This was in General Prescott’s room.
Dicky crept close to the fence that surrounded the house. Everything was perfectly quiet—even the housedog slept peacefully on the kitchen steps. After looking about very carefully, he saw a path leading into the underbrush toward the ravine.
He slipped across the yard and into this path, and after what seemed to him a long, long wait, he saw advancing noiselessly through the gloom a man with one hand held up, as Jack Bell had described. Dicky went up and whispered:—
“Everything is quiet. The dog is asleep on the back steps, and General Prescott’s room is directly at the front door.”
In a minute more twenty men had silently appeared, as if out of the ground, and among them was a burly negro known as Sam Ink, from his jetty blackness.
They crept through the fence and noiselessly surrounded three sides of the house, the dog meanwhile sleeping peacefully, as they were careful not to go near enough to rouse him. Almost as soon as their preparations were completed the light in the northwest room was put out. Dicky wondered what means they would take to open the front door, which according to the custom of the time was no doubt barred as well as locked. He was quickly enlightened, though, for as soon as the preparations were complete Sam Ink backed off about twenty yards, and then, starting on a run, he lowered his head and made straight for the door, and the next minute the crash of splintered wood was heard and Sam’s head had gone through the panel of the door.
It was only the work of a second then to undo the lock and take down the bar, and as the sound of shuffling feet in various parts of the house was heard General Prescott himself opened the door of his room to see what was the matter. He had no time to strike a flint, but one of the Americans, who had a dark lantern, suddenly flashed it on the group and then twenty stalwart arms seized the British officer and dragged him out of the door and made a rush for the path through the woods.