and now as she regarded her
wooden doll a great longing for a sight of his dear face made her forget
everything, and she leaned her head against a little pine and cried
silently. But as she cried the remembrance of the taunts of the Cary
children came into her thoughts, and she dried her eyes.

"'Tis near the hour when they go to the spring," she said, laying the doll
carefully back in its former resting place. "I will but walk that way that
they may not think me afraid of their ill-seeming words," and with her
dark head more erect than usual, Anne made her way down the path, her
brown feet sinking ankle-deep in the warm sand at every step.

The Cary children, a boy and a girl, both somewhat Anne's seniors, were
already filling their buckets at the spring. Jimmie Starkweather was
there, and a number of younger children ran shouting up and down the
little stream which flowed from the spring across the road.

As Anne came near, Jimmie Starkweather called out: "Oh, Anne Nelson! The
Indians from Truro are camping at Shankpainter's Pond. I've been over
there, near enough to see them at work, this morning. My father says
they'll be gone as soon as they see the British vessels. We'll not have
time to buy moccasins if they go so quickly."

Anne's eyes rested for a moment upon Jimmie, but she did not speak. She
could hear the Carys whispering as they dipped their buckets in the
spring, and as she came nearer, their voices rose loudly: "Daughter of a
spy! Beggar-child! Beggar-child!"

But their taunts vanished in splutterings and pleas for mercy; for at
their first word Anne had sprung upon them like a young tiger. She had
wrenched the bucket of water from the astonished boy and flung it in his
face with such energy that he had toppled over backward, soused and
whimpering; then she had turned upon his sister, sending handful after
handful of sand into the face of that astonished child, until she fled
from her, wailing for mercy.

But Anne pursued her relentlessly, and Captain Enos Stoddard, making his
mournful way toward the shore, could hardly believe his own senses when he
looked upon the scene--the Cary boy prostrate and humble, while his
sister, pursued by Anne, prayed for Anne to stop the deluge of sand that
seemed to fill the air about her.

"I'll not be called ill-seeming names!" shrieked Anne. "If thou sayest
'traitor' or 'spy' to me again I will do worse things to you!"

Captain Stoddard stood still for a moment.