ving to death. What do you want me to do?"

"What would do the children more good than anything, the women say, would
be milk. If I could get a keg that would hold two or three gallons--and a
watertight box with about twenty pounds of bread, I could swim back with
them just as I came. I would show you the exact spot where I landed, and
would come out again in four days. If you could put a supply ready for
me, every fourth night, among the bushes at the mouth of the river, with
a little lantern to show me the exact spot, I could come down with the
tide, get the things, and float back again when the tide turns."

"I could do that, easily enough," Walter said. "The mouth of the river is
quite beyond our lines. But it is very risky for you, John. You might get
shot, if a sentry were to see you."

"I do not think that there is much fear of that," John said. "Just
floating along as I do, without swimming at all, there is only just my
face above water, and it would be hardly possible for a sentry to see me;
but if I were shot, I could not die in a better cause."

"I think, John, if you don't mind, I should like to tell my father. I am
quite sure he would not object, and, in case you should happen to get
caught, you could refer at once to him to prove that you were not a spy.
They make very short work of spies. But if you were to demand to be
brought to Captain Davenant, and say you were acting in accordance with
his knowledge, no doubt they would bring you."

"Do as you think best, Walter, but don't tell him, unless you feel almost
sure that he will not object."

"There is no fear of that," Walter said. "He is constantly lamenting over
the sufferings of the people of Derry, and has, all along, been in favour
of attempting to storm the place by force, so as to put a stop to all
this useless suffering. Now, John, you had better lie down on that straw
bed of mine, and get a sleep. After that, you will be ready for another
meal. I will tell Larry to go out among the market people, and buy three
gallons of milk and twenty pounds of bread. There are plenty of small
spirit kegs about, which will do capitally for the milk, and I don't
think that we can have anything better than one of them for the bread. We
can head it up, and make it watertight. How do you mean to get into the
town? I should have thought that they were likely to be seized."

"So they would be," John said. "I shall hide them in some bushes at the
foot of the wal