"It's a bad night to cross," growled the older fisherman, looking out through the little window at the snow-flakes sifting through the ray of light.
"There's gold for you in the venture," coughed Abel Norton, who had regained his composure partly, but was wheezing badly. He shook the water from the shoulders of his great coat, and dove into a capacious pocket. "This will be doubled if you succeed," he said, putting two gold pieces on the edge of a sawhorse.
"What time and where, Mr. Norton?" said the younger man, more respectfully.
"Be at Striker's wharf at eleven o'clock. A tall young man will hail you. Ask no questions, but put him on the other side. He may add something to this himself."
"Will we try it, lad?" put in the older fisherman.
"Aye," was the response; "we have butted the tide at a worse hour for good reason."
A minute more Abel was outside and climbing the bank; he skirted through the vacant fields, and again was amidst the houses. The effect of his illness was apparent, his steps were rather faltering, and it was ten o'clock when he reached Broadway. He turned down the lane, and stopped before the brick house in which Mr. Anderson had once held his school. He knocked on the door, and a lanky servant girl admitted him. "I would see your master at once," said Abel, as he passed on into the study.
Mr. Anderson was seated at the end of the long table, his great horn spectacles giving him an expression of constant surprise. A green shade shielded his eyes from the glare of a bright lamp. "Gadzooks!" he exclaimed. "Are you not taking risks, out on such a night as this?"
"There are larger risks often taken," responded the older man, throwing himself back in a chair and pulling at his neckerchief. "I am going to break a rule, for the matter is urgent. We must talk despite the embargo laid on certain subjects of conversation. Listen. Our young friend has escaped. Number Four has broken out."
"I did not know it was to be to-night," said Mr. Anderson. "Are you sure? I was at the prison this afternoon, and saw no signal. You remember, if everything was ready, he was to place two crusts of bread outside the door of his cell. Only one was there. That meant to-morrow."