"Here." And she quietly entered the room, her face pale, but perfectly calm. "The noise hath awakened the little boys, but I have left Shubar with them, and promised to return shortly." "Where is Joane?" her husband asked quickly. "With Shubar and the boys." "Good; for then there be one gun near, to assure the little ones." He had been nervously fingering the hammer of his own piece, and while speaking he crossed the room and took a position near that side of the house from whence came the sound of firearms. Anne remained by the hearth, watching him closely, her tightly clenched hands being all that told of the agitation within. "Are the little ones much affrighted?" he asked. "No," she said, still in her calm, sweet fashion; "they do not seem to be--that is, not much. Humphrey begged that he might have a gun, and Robert sat quiet, looking at me with eyes so like your own as he asked, 'Art fearful, mother? Father will ne'er let them hurt us.'" John Devereux smiled proudly, for the moment forgetting the din about them. "And John," he asked,--"what said our second son?" "He seemeth most affrighted of all," she replied. "He wept at first, and hid his face in my gown; but he was calm when I came away. Thou knowest, John, that the lad hath not been well since the fever, last fall." "Aye, true,--poor little Jack!" the father said. And he now wondered what might have happened outside, for there was a ceasing of the uproar. He listened intently a moment. "Methinks, sweetheart, I'd best go outside and see what this silence doth mean. Thou'lt not be fearful if I leave the house awhile?" She grew still paler, but only shook her head. Then she asked suddenly, "Where be Parson Legg?" Husband and wife looked about the room, and then at one another. "He was here when the firing began," said John, finding it difficult not to smile as he recalled the scene. "But wherever can he have gone?" persisted Anne. "Hiding somewhere, I warrant me," was her husband's reply. "He is an arrant--" His words were drowned by the roar of a blunderbuss, coming apparently from just over their heads, and this was followed a moment later by a wild yell of triumph from outside. It was from John's men, and he started to open the door. But before he could do this there arose such a clamor in the nursery above that he and Anne, forgetful of all else, sped up the stairway. Old Shubar's voice came to them raised in shrill cries, echoed by those of the boys,--only that Humphrey and Robert seemed to speak more from indignation than fright. Wondering what it could all mean, they hurried into the room, where an absurd sight met their alarmed eyes.