“We are going to Southac street, you know,” she said, “and we shall bring home Roux and his wife, Charles, and the two children. That’s five. The baby we don’t count,” she playfully added.
Harrington was speechless with emotion.
“In Temple street they will be safe for the present,” she continued. “Then we can decide on the next step. I think Roux must remove to Worcester, for whatever they may do in Boston, I believe they will never take a fugitive from Worcester. There’s good blood yet in the heart of the Commonwealth, the heart of which, moreover, is the heart of Wentworth Higginson.”
Wentworth Higginson was, at that period, the gallant minister of the Free Church at Worcester, a man with the Revolutionary soul of fire, and the incarnate nucleus of that glorious public spirit which is still prompt to defend a man against the kidnappers in the heart of the old Commonwealth.
“Meanwhile,” pursued Muriel, “I’ll take care of poor Roux.”
“Oh, Muriel!” said Harrington, fervently, “there is no nobleness, no tenderness, like yours.”
In the wan moonlight he saw her color under his impassioned gaze. She did not reply for a moment, but turning her face away, she laid her hand upon his arm, and its almost imperceptible tremor sent a mystical, sweet agitation through his being.
“It is nothing but a duty,” she replied, presently, in a gentle voice. “A clear and simple duty. Life opens plainlier to me every day, and I see that I have wealth and strength and youth, that I may succor and protect the poor!”
No more was said, but tranced in thoughts and feelings too sacred and deep for words, they moved in silence through the dim and solitary streets, vaguely lit by the wan lustre of the moon. There were lights in the houses as they passed, for it was not yet ten o’clock, but save a few boys, white and negro, fantastically playing in some of the streets, and half-dispirited in their nocturnal games by the strange bleakness of the air, they hardly met a person.