Part 8 (1/2)

”I don't mind bein' hung,” he shouted, ”not if it's done proper, but no man kin call me a Tory lessen my hands are tied, without gittin' hurt.

An' if my hands was tied I'd do some hollerin', now you hear to me.”

A man back in the crowd let out a laugh as loud as the braying of an a.s.s. Others followed his example. The danger was pa.s.sed. Solomon shouted:

”I used to know Preston when I were a scout in Amherst's army fightin'

Injuns an' Frenchmen, which they's more'n twenty notches on the stock o' my rifle an' fourteen on my pelt, an' my name is Solomon Binkus from Albany, New York, an' if you'll excuse us, we'll put fer hum as soon as we kin git erway convenient.”

They started for The s.h.i.+p and Anchor with a number of men and boys following and trying to talk with them.

”I'll tell ye, Jack, they's trouble ahead,” said Solomon as they made their way through the crowded streets.

Many were saying that there could be no more peace with England.

In the morning they learned that three men had been killed and five others wounded by the soldiers. Squads of men and boys with loaded muskets were marching into town from the country.

Jack and Solomon attended the town meeting that day in the old South Meeting-House. It was a quiet and orderly crowd that listened to the speeches of Josiah Quincy, John Hanc.o.c.k and Samuel Adams, demanding calmly but firmly that the soldiers be forthwith removed from the city.

The famous John Hanc.o.c.k cut a great figure in Boston those days. It is not surprising that Jack was impressed by his grandeur for he had entered the meeting-house in a scarlet velvet cap and a blue damask gown lined with velvet and strode to the platform with a dignity even above his garments. As he faced about the boy did not fail to notice and admire the white satin waistcoat and white silk stockings and red morocco slippers. Mr. Quincy made a statement which stuck like a bur in Jack Irons' memory of that day and perhaps all the faster because he did not quite understand it. The speaker said: ”The dragon's teeth have been sown.”

The chairman asked if there was any citizen present who had been on the scene at or about the time of the shooting. Solomon Binkus arose and held up his hand and was asked to go to the minister's room and confer with the committee.

Mr. John Adams called at the inn that evening and announced that he was to defend Captain Preston and would require the help of Jack and Solomon as witnesses. For that reason they were detained some days in Boston and released finally on the promise to return when their services were required.

They left Boston by stage and one evening in early April, traveling afoot, they saw the familiar boneheads around the pasture lands above Albany where the farmers had crowned their fence stakes with the skeleton heads of deer, moose, sheep and cattle in which birds had the habit of building their nests. It had been thawing for days, but the night had fallen clear and cold. They had stopped at the house of a settler some miles northeast of Albany to get a sled load of Solomon's pelts which had been stretched and hung there. Weary of the brittle snow, they took to the river a mile or so above the little city, Solomon hauling his sled. Jack had put on the new skates which he had bought in Bennington where they had gone for a visit with old friends.

They were out on the clear ice, far from either sh.o.r.e, when they heard an alarming peal of ”river thunder”--a name which Binkus applied to a curious phenomenon often accompanied by great danger to those on the rotted roof of the Hudson. The hidden water had been swelling.

Suddenly it had made a rip in the great ice vault a mile long with a noise like the explosion of a barrel of powder. The rip ran north and south about mid-stream. They were on the west sheet and felt it waver and subside till it had found a bearing on the river surface.

”We must git off o' here quick,” said Binkus. ”She's goin' to break up.”

”Let me have the sled and as soon as I get going, you hop on,” said Jack.

The boy began skating straight toward the sh.o.r.e, drawing the sled and its load, Solomon kicking out behind with his spiked boots until they were well under way. They heard the east sheet breaking up before they had made half the distance to safe footing. Then their own began to crack into sections as big ”as a ten-acre lot,” Mr. Binkus said, ”an'

the noise was like a battle, but Jack kept a-goin' an' me settin' light an' my mind a-pus.h.i.+n' like a scairt deer.” Water was flooding over the ice which had broken near sh.o.r.e, but the skater jumped the crack before it was wider than a man's hand and took the sled with him. They reached the river's edge before the ice began heaving and there the sloped snow had been wet and frozen to rocks and bushes, so they were able to make their way through it.

”Now, we're even,” said Solomon when they had hauled the sled up the river bank while he looked back at the ice now breaking and beginning to pile up, ”I done you a favor an' you've done me one. It's my turn next.”

This was the third in the remarkable series of adventures which came to these men.

They had a hearty welcome at the little house near The King's Arms, where they sat until midnight telling of their adventures. In the midst of it, Jack said to his father:

”I heard a speaker say in Boston that the dragon's teeth had been sown.

What does that mean?”

”It means that war is coming,” said John Irons. ”We might as well get ready for it.”

These words, coming from his father, gave him a shock of surprise. He began to think of the effect of war on his own fortunes.

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