The gunsmith’s shop was in a narrow lane behind the church, and when she reached it, she found its door tightly barred and a crude sign dangling from the latch. Gorn to Cambridj till further notiz, the sign said.
She stood there uncertainly for a moment, and looked about her. The soft gray sky seemed to match her own mood, uncertain whether to pour down rain or let the sun shine through. Between the houses she could see the waters of the river, a darker gray. Not all the men had followed the gunsmith’s example, for busy crews were working about the wharves and slips, hammers rang from the shipyards, and the tall chimneys of the distillery lifted their plumes of smoke, just as if it were an ordinary morning. Somehow the sight reassured her. She’d go and look for Dick, she thought, and make sure that he hadn’t run off with the Minutemen. Then she’d go home and tell Gran about the gunsmith, take off her hat, and get ready to help with the baking.
As she passed the sailors’ boardinghouse in Chandler’s Lane, she noticed Eben in the backyard chopping wood, and she called to him. He straightened up, looked at her for a minute, then put his ax down and came over to the board fence.
“What are you after, Kitty? ’Tisn’t no use looking for Dick,” he said.
“I don’t know that I was looking for Dick,” said Kitty tartly, chagrined because Eben had read her mind so plain. “But now that you speak of him, I don’t suppose he’s off for Cambridge, too?”
Eben nodded solemnly. “Ye-a, Dick’s gone.”
Kitty felt shocked in spite of herself. “But how could he? He doesn’t have a gun.”
“He’s got a tomahawk,” said Eben. “Tomahawk they took out o’ his great-grandmother’s head when the Indian tried to scalp her up in Haverhill in ’96.”
“Why, I know that old thing,” cried Kitty. “It’s duller’n a hoe. We played with it when we were children. Might as well try to fight with a warming pan!”
Eben shrugged. “Colonel told him to come along,” he said. “Told him there’d be men there was poorer armed, he didn’t doubt. Said the courage to go and the feet to get him there was all he’d really need.” Suddenly he fell silent. He looked down at his own bare feet and stubbed one great toe in the moist earth.