“Then why begin now?” asked Katrina. “Because I was down on my luck, and there seemed no other way. Listen! For two years I have served as a soldier in the British army, and no more honest one ever entered the province. I did not mind hard work, but my health gave out, and at last the rude fare and the homesickness I could stand no longer, and three days ago I deserted from the English fort down yonder. The officers are on my track, but, so far, disguised as an old beggar, I have escaped detection beneath their very noses. If caught I shall be flogged within an inch of my life, and, it may be, shot. Just over the water my wife and a blue-eyed lass like you are longing for my return, but, saving your guilder, I was penniless, and so, for the first time, determined to take what was not my own.” “Poor man!” sighed Katrina, the tears starting. “To-morrow night the _Golden Lion_ sails for England. Her crew, after the New-Year festivities, will be dazed at least, so I can readily conceal myself until the ship is out at sea. Then ho! for home and my little Jeanie!” “And as a bad, wicked robber will you go to her?” asked the girl. “No; indeed no!” cried the man, emptying his sack. “You have saved me from that, little lady, as well as from starvation to-day, for I would not steal from you or yours. Give me but these krullers to eat while I am a stowaway, and all the plate I will leave.” “Yes, that will I do,” said Katrina, rejoiced, and she herself dropped the crisp cakes into the man’s bag. “Now at once go, and godspeed.” “But first you must promise to mention this meeting to no one until after the _Golden Lion_ weighs anchor at seven o’clock on New-Year’s night.” “To my mother may I not?” asked Katrina. “No, no, to nobody! Oh, remember my life is in your hands! Promise, I beg.” His tone was so imploring the girl was touched. “I like it not, but I promise,” she said. “Thank you. Farewell.” And again disguised, the deserter departed, as he came, by a back window. Feeling as though in a dream, Katrina rearranged the disordered table, and then, creeping up to bed, fell so sound asleep that she never heard Jan when he awoke the household with his “Happy New-Years.” Gayly the sunbeams glittered on the black-and-yellow gables that 1st of January, and fully as resplendent were the maids and matrons of New York in their best muslins and brocades; while Katrina presented a very quaint, attractive little vision when she came down in her taffeta gown and embroidered stomacher, with her amber beads about her neck. Her face was hardly in accord with her attire, however, when she found every one demanding, “What has become of the krullers--the New-Year krullers?” Madam Van Twinkle looked flushed and angry. “The beautiful cakes with which I so much trouble took!” she cried. “Ach! a bad, wicked theft it is, and a mystery unaccountable.” “Mebbe de great ole mynheer and his vrouw gobbled ’em up,” put in Sophy.