Chapter 24

"March--march--march!
Making sounds as they tread,
Ho-ho! how they step,
Going down to the dead."

Coxe.

The time Maud consumed in her meditations over the box and its
contents, had been employed by the captain in preparations for his
enterprise. Joyce, young Blodget, Jamie and Mike, led by their
commander in person, were to compose the whole force on the occasion;
and every man had been busy in getting his arms, ammunition and
provisions ready, for the last half-hour. When captain Willoughby,
therefore, had taken leave of his family, he found the party in a
condition to move.

The first great desideratum was to quit the Hut unseen. Joel and his
followers were still at work, in distant fields; but they all carefully
avoided that side of the Knoll which would have brought them within
reach of the musket, and this left all behind the cliff unobserved,
unless Indians were in the woods in that direction. As Mike had so
recently passed in by that route, however, the probability was the
whole party still remained in the neighbourhood of the mills, where all
accounts agreed in saying they mainly kept. It was the intention of the
captain, therefore, to sally by the rivulet and the rear of the house,
and to gain the woods under cover of the bushes on the banks of the
former, as had already been done by so many since the inroad.

The great difficulty was to quit the house, and reach the bed of the
stream, unseen. This step, however, was a good deal facilitated by
means of Joel's sally-port, the overseer having taken, himself, all the
precautions against detection of which the case well admitted.
Nevertheless, there was the distance between the palisades and the base
of the rocks, some forty or fifty yards, which was entirely uncovered,
and had to be passed under the notice of any wandering eyes that might
happen to be turned in that quarter. After much reflection, the captain
and serjeant came to the conclusion to adopt the following mode of
proceeding.

Blodget passed the hole, by himself, unarmed, rolling down the
declivity until he reached the stream. Here a thicket concealed him
sufficiently, the bushes extending along the base of the rocks,
following the curvature of the rivulet. Once within these bushes, there
was little danger of detection. As soon as it was ascertained that the
young man was beneath the most eastern of the outer windows of the
northern wing, the only one of the entire range that had bushes
directly under it, all the rifles were lowered down to him, two at a
time, care being had that no one should appear at the window during the
operation. This was easily effected, jerks of the rope sufficing for
the necessary signals to haul in the line. The