“Eb--en!” shouted a buxom woman from the back steps of the boardinghouse. “Take in my washing off the line! Step lively there!” Eben muttered, and his face burned crimson as he walked away. Kitty looked after him for a moment, and her heart stirred with quick sympathy. It must be hard for Eben to be left behind to do such humble chores while his friend had gone off to war and been accepted as a man. The soft drizzle turned into a downpour. She thought, belatedly and with some alarm, of the roses on her hat. She turned and hurried back to Market Square and up the hill, walking with her head bent because of the rain, trying to shield her finery with one lifted hand. So it was that she did not see him until they almost collided under the tavern sign that hung on a long pole high over the sloping street. Then she caught her breath and stepped back, and looked up into the eyes of Tom Trask, the logger from Derryfield. He stood there, bareheaded in the rain, and he wore the same hunting shirt and moosehide breeches, but he was not smiling now, though his gray eyes lighted with recognition. “Playing games on the dock tonight, Miss Kitty?” he asked her, and in spite of his sober face, his voice had a teasing note in it. She smiled and shook the rain from her lashes. “How did you know my name was Kitty?” she asked him. “Heard ’em call you that times enough--last night, I mean, whilst I was looking on.” His eyes smiled now, but his mouth remained a thin line. He seemed to be waiting for her answer. “No,” she said. “We’re not often so silly, and besides, I doubt if the rain will stop. And even if it did--there are hardly enough of us left to play.” He nodded. “I seen two o’ your friends marching off last night,” he said. “All our crew was asleep on the raft when the bells begun to go, but when we got into town and heard the news, ’twas no surprise. I was over to Johnny Stark’s sawmill just before I started down river, and he said he figured Boston had stood about all they could o’ the British, and the British had stood about all they could o’ Boston. Said he expected to be taking his gun down any day. Well, if he’s got the word, he’s likely there, him and the rest o’ the boys, and I aim to join them, only--” Kitty could feel her hair turning dank and the raindrops thickening on her lashes. She thought of her sodden hat, and sighed inwardly, but she made no move to excuse herself and leave the stranger. “--only I left my musket at home in Derryfield, and the gunsmiths here ain’t doing business today. Has any o’ your menfolk got a spare gun, Miss Kitty?” She hesitated. He held out his lean hard hands with freckles on the backs of them. “I suppose I could use these on the varmints,” he muttered. “But powder and ball’s the quicker way.” “There is a gun in the barn loft that belonged to my father,” she said slowly. “You speak like your daddy’s dead,” he answered, not looking at her.