xious for a hempen
necklace, nor lodgings in Walnut Street. So I have little time to
spare."

With that he related his morning's adventure and how he had left his
team.

"Canst thou send a blind message to the Pewter Platter at once? Jonas
Evans will understand."

"Yes. Patty will be best. We can trust her, and she will hardly be
noted. And thou?"

"I must get out of the town in some sort of disguise. There is much
behind this that I do not know."

Patty was dispatched on her errand. "Sit still, child, with thy book,
and presently thou shalt know what is meet," said she.

Andrew Henry went briefly over his inner life for the last two months,
his desire to enlist in the Continental army, his shrinking from the
pain it would be to his parents.

"But now, madam, it would bring greater trouble on them for me to go
home. The British would likely arrest me."

"Yes, I see. And thou hast resolved to be a soldier lad? Not from the
teasing of little Primrose, I hope."

"No, madam, though I shall be her soldier as well. But those brave men
at Valley Forge have been before my eyes night and day. I should have
done this a little later, anyhow. My father and mother are in good
hands."

"Heaven keep thee! But better a hundred times perish on the field of
battle than be thrust into that vile den, the Walnut Street Jail, where
that fiend in human shape, Cunningham, works his cruel will on helpless
men. Not a day but dead bodies are carried out, some of them bruised and
beaten and vermin-covered. Faugh! The thought sickens me! Yes, thou must
escape. Primrose, child, come in."

She ran eagerly to Andrew, who greeted her with a smile. Then Patty
returned breathless.

"It is all right. They will find nothing from cellar to the top layer of
the chimney. But Master Evans says get out of the town as fast as you
can."

Madam Wetherill was considering. "A disguise," she said. "A suit of
Captain Nevitt's is here, but thou couldst hardly squeeze into it. At
thirty thou wilt be the counterpart of thy uncle Philemon. Thou wilt go
to Valley Forge?"

"Yes. After I have struck into the old Perkiomen road no one will look
for me. It is getting through the city. And the time is brief. I would
not for worlds raise any suspicion for thee."

"Patty, exercise thy quick wit. If we could dress him up as a young man
of fashion--or make him into Ralph Jeffries, who is more barrel-shaped.
But there, the pass!"

"I have it," cried Patty wit