own, in which case he would have
us at a disadvantage.

Neither were we minded to speak of trifling matters. The situation was
all too full of peril, and there were so many chances we would come to
grief, that it was well nigh impossible for us to do other than sit
there in gloomy silence, watching the prisoners even while we feared
each instant to hear an outcry at the door, which would tell that the
lobster backs had come to learn we from Cambridge were hiding there.

As the moments passed, so slowly that it seemed as if each was near an
hour in length, I came to believe beyond a question that Hiram would be,
if he had not already been, taken into custody, and strove to form some
plan of action, saying to myself that we would wait no longer than until
the setting of the sun before taking to our heels, leaving the prisoners
to be set free by whomsoever should visit the house.

Now and again at short intervals I ascended the ladder, peering through
the crevices of the shutters to learn how near to setting the sun might
be, and thus succeeded in so working myself into a fever of anxiety and
fear as to be like one who has lost his senses.

It so chanced that I was in the upper room trying to gain some idea of
the time, when there came two sharp raps on the shutter through which I
was peering, and so nervous had I become that I cried aloud in fear,
darting back to the trap-door, positive that none other than a lobster
back or a Tory could be thus striving to attract our attention.

While one might have counted ten I entirely forgot what had been agreed
upon between Hiram Griffin and me, and my feet were already upon the
rungs of the ladder to descend, when the cob-webs seemed suddenly to
have been blown from my brain, allowing me to realize that despite all
the dangers Hiram had succeeded in gratifying his whim without loss of
liberty.

You may well fancy that I opened the door in a twinkling, for it was
dangerous to have him standing there in the broad light of day, and when
he was come into the room, having closed and barred the door behind him,
I flung my arms around his neck, clinging to him as if he was one lately
returned from the very verge of the grave, as indeed I believe to this
day was the case.

"Why, lad, what has come over you?" he asked in astonishment. "You are
shaking like an old woman with the palsy, and your face is as white as I
have heard it said ghosts' faces are."

"I had brought myself to b