On the following morning she sallied forth, so engrossed in her difficulties, or her project, that she paid no heed to the distant sound of cannon, nor to the groups of townspeople who stood about on corners or stoops, evidently discussing something of interest; and it was only when she turned into the market-place, and found it empty alike of buyers and sellers that she was made to realise that something unusual was occurring.
“Why are all the stands closed this morning?” she asked of an urchin.
“’Cause nawthing ’s come ter town along of the fightin’.”
“Fighting?”
“Guess you ’re a deefy,” contemptuously suggested the youngster. “Don’t you hear them guns? The grenadiers went out lickety split this mornin’ and folks says they’ve got Washington surrounded, an’ll have him captured by night. All the other boys hez gone out on the Germantown road ter see the fun, but daddy said he’d lick me if I went, so I did n’t dare,” he added dejectedly. “Hurrah! There come some more wounded!” he cried, with sudden cheerfulness and breaking into a run as an army van came in sight down Second Street.
The girl turned away and went into one of the few shops which had opened its shutters.
“You would not take Continental money yesterday,” she said to the proprietor; “but perhaps you—you will—I thought—I have no other kind of money, but perhaps you will accept this in payment?” Janice, with a flushed, anxious face, unwrapped from her handkerchief and laid down on the counter the miniature frame.
The man took it up and eyed it for a moment, then raised it to his mouth and pressed his teeth on the edge; satisfied by the experiment, he scrutinised the brilliants. “How d’ ye come by this?” he demanded suspiciously.
“Oh, indeed, sir,” explained Janice, growing yet redder, “it is mine, I assure you, given me by—that is, he said I might keep it.”
“’Tain’t for me to say it ain’t yourn,” responded the shop-keeper; “but the times is bad times and there ’s roguery of all sorts going on in the city.” He looked it over again, and demanded, “Who does ‘W. H. J. B.’ mean?”