"Nay, Mistress Oglander," stammered Timothy, "I know not what you mean! I am but gathering a few poor herbs for my father, Master Trollope, the barber-surgeon of Plymouth, and I beg you to release me."
Mistress Oglander looked strangely incredulous, and for a moment she relaxed her hold of him. She glanced round as though in search of someone whom she expected to see among the trees at the edge of the lake.
"I care not whose son you may be," said she. "In real truth you are no man's son; nor, so please you, am I Drusilla Oglander; for you are a Spanish treasure-ship that I have captured on the high seas, while I am the good ship Prudence of Falmouth, who now intendeth to take you as my prize to England."
Timothy seemed to apprehend her purpose, for he calmly yielded himself to her humour.
"An that be the way of it all," quoth he, "then am I well content. But I do pray that England doth lie at no great distance from this spot, for I must get home with my bag of herbs for the which my father is impatiently waiting."
"'Tis but a little way beyond the beeches yonder," explained Drusilla, indicating three tall trees that grew in the midst of a shrubbery at the far end of the little lake. "'Twill take but a few moments to cross the Atlantic Ocean, and then we are there."
She drew him onward for some yards, when suddenly he stopped. She glanced at him in quick alarm.
"Nay," she cried, "you must not sink! You are to be refitted when we reach port, and then, you know, you will be made into an English ship."
But Timothy still hesitated, and even made a movement as if to free himself and run away.