He asked advice from his friends, especially from Captain William Hull, of his old regiment, who had also been one of his fellow students at college. Captain Hull urged him strongly not to do it. He reminded him how men feel about a spy and told him, too, that it was doubtful if, with his frank, open character, he could ever succeed in deceiving people and pretending to be what he was not. He begged him for the sake of his family and his friends to give it up because it might end for him in a disgraceful death. Captain Hale replied, "I am fully sensible of the consequences of discovery and capture in such a situation. But for a year I have been in the army and have not rendered any material service while receiving a compensation for which I make no return. Yet I am not influenced by the hope of promotion or reward. I wish to be useful, and every kind of service necessary to the public good becomes honorable by being necessary. But," he added, taking his friend's hand affectionately, "I will reflect, and do nothing but what duty demands." He decided to go, and left the American camp the second week in September. He was to cross to Long Island and approach the British position from the rear, and he was to go as a schoolmaster looking for employment, which was the best disguise he could assume as he had once been a schoolmaster and might easily pass for one again. Just what his orders and instructions were we do not know, as the service was a secret one. His faithful sergeant, Stephen Hempstead, of New London, went with him part of the way. On account of British ships cruising in the East Elver and in the Sound, they were obliged to go as far as Norwalk, Connecticut, before it was safe to cross. Hempstead tells us that at Norwalk Captain Hale changed his uniform for a plain suit of citizen's brown clothes, with a round, broad-brimmed hat, took off his silver shoe-buckles, and left all his papers behind except his college diploma, which he thought might be useful. Then he said good-bye to Hempstead, telling him to wait for him there, and an armed sloop commanded by Captain Pond--probably Charles Pond, of Milford, a fellow officer in Hale's regiment--carried him over to Huntington on Long Island. Hempstead waited, but Captain Hale never returned. The next news his friends received was the news of his capture and execution as a spy in the British camp. We shall probably never know just what happened after he left Huntington, what adventures he met with or what narrow escapes he had. About the time that he crossed the Sound, Sir William Howe, the British general, moved over to New York and took possession of the city, and Washington's suspense ended. Perhaps Captain Hale did not learn of this until it was too late to return, or, perhaps, knowing it, he chose to go on and finish the work he had begun and take back information of the new position of the enemy.