some lobster backs, having overheard our words, were come to lend the
Tory lad a hand.

Luckily the cry was choked before it escaped my lips, else I should have
been bowed with shame, for on the moment I saw that it was none other
than Doctor Warren who had seized Archie, and we lads knew him for one
who would cut off his right hand rather than take the part of a Tory
against a so-called rebel.

"Is it well to spend your time brawling on the streets with such as that
lad, when there is work you might do in behalf of the Cause?" the doctor
asked sharply, and, twisting himself round that he might look the good
man squarely in the face, Archie cried:

"What is there that lads like us might do at such a time, sir? We are
willing enough; but lack opportunity."

"I came out in search of one who can be trusted to carry a message into
the country; but fail to find him. It strikes me that lads like you
could be employed in such tasks, and thus give men full grown the
opportunity of doing braver work though nothing could be more important
than my business of this night. Think you it would be possible to leave
Boston within the hour, and without attracting the attention of the
guards?" the doctor added after a brief time of thought.

"Ay, we can go out of Boston a dozen times over, 'twixt now and sunrise,
without any lobster back being the wiser," I cried, determined if there
was aught to be done in behalf of the Cause that night, I would have a
hand in it.

"Are you the son of that Samuel Wright who lately left home to go to
Cambridge, and has not yet returned?" the doctor asked, releasing his
hold on Archie's collar that he might wheel about to face me.

"Ay, that I am, sir," was my reply, "and that he has left Boston on
honest business Master Hancock himself can testify."

"There is no need of testimony as to his character so far as I am
concerned," the gentleman said with a kindly smile. "I can trust his
son, surely, knowing the father as I do. Now how might it be possible
for you to leave this town secretly?"

"I have a boat hidden at the old ship-yard where the lobster backs will
never be able to find her, and we three have been to Roxbury in her half
a dozen times since the guard at the Neck have had their eyes opened,
without any one's being the wiser. If so be you would send a message, we
three can carry it, sir," and so eager was I for him to accept my
services that I trembled like one in an ague.

"And who