Uncertain and on his guard, Tom followed his companion up the slope through the firefly-studded grass. More than a week now, he and the Newburyport lad had been sleeping at night with their feet toward the same campfire--when they did sleep--sharing the same ration of salt pork and corn meal. He had not gone back to Medford after they burned the _Diana_, for he and Johnny kept telling themselves that they would borrow a boat and row over to Charlestown to see the girls, but not until tonight had they been able to get away. They had not wasted their time, though. They had gone with the raiding parties that constantly scoured the islands all the way from Chelsea Neck to the deep sea. They had helped to burn Tory barns and steal Tory cattle. Tom felt he could give a good account of himself when he got back to his own company, but he was not so sure Captain Moore would consider it a good account. He was even more dubious about the attitude of the Colonel, his old friend, Johnny Stark. That they were old friends wouldn’t make any difference at all, when there was business in hand. Yes, tonight after he’d seen Miss Kitty again and stolen a kiss or two, he thought he’d better make for Medford, with or without young Pettengall. Maybe he’d better ask now just what his companion intended to do. At that moment they reached the crest of Breed’s Hill and paused to look down. “Them lights over there must be Boston,” Johnny told him. “You ever been there, Tom? I heard it’s the greatest city in North America. The best anyway.” “Didn’t know we had any other cities,” said Tom, grinning in the darkness. Johnny took him seriously. “Course we have,” he hastened to protest. “There’s New York, and Philadelphia where the Great Congress meets. Some others further south, I guess, and all of ’em sending help to Boston. There’s talk they’ll even send their soldiers here.” “Believe it when I see them,” said Tom skeptically. “But you ask me, and I say no, I never been to Boston. I live a sight of a ways off, you know, up the Merrimack.” They stood there together a moment in the starlight and cool sea wind, the sweetness of ripe hay. “I know,” said Johnny. “You didn’t go back there, ever--after we got news of Concord Fight, did you? Ain’t you got some folks waiting for you to come home?” Tom shrugged. “Folks is all dead,” he told Johnny. “Won’t nobody miss me. Well--maybe a girl or two.” Then he spoke more quickly and in a lighter tone. “But I know where I will be missed, I bet, and that’s back in Medford. My company was less than half full strength when I left, and I better be getting myself over there. How about you?” “I ought to be in Cambridge, I guess, with Captain Little’s company.” “Moses Little? Heard he’d been made a colonel, just like Stark.” “I don’t know. I didn’t hear.” They were starting down the hill now, toward a cluster of roofs and gables with a tall spire in the midst of it, toward a shadowy line of wharves along the shore.