The troop were now reduced to eleven, for Christopher Kidd, making the twelfth, and having leave of absence after his services to my father in riding to Exeter, was expected to return from his farm but for the afternoon's drill; lacking whom, the rest had been dismissed for dinner at noon, which was the hour when I began so unmaidenly to dress myself out in my dead brothers' clothes. It was a business that occupied me longer than I had thought for, and when it came to the boots and the armor I wished I had Prue's nimble fingers to help me. But she, I knew, though she would never have confessed so much, was somewhere watching for the return of Christopher. At last, however, I made shift to fasten together about me the back- and breast-pieces; for the boots, I stuffed the toes of each with an handkerchief, and so made them sit passably well, the practising which device called to my mind how in the dark I had done the same for Ned to the filthy brogues he wore in leaving us. So, being dressed at all points to my satisfaction, the next thing was to contrive reaching the stables unobserved. For this my reasons were two: I knew the men would soon reassemble, and wished, in my folly, to take part in their evolutions in such manner that none could forbid without openly chiding me before the yokels; which I knew neither my father nor Emmet would do, whatever their censures might be in private. But far stronger was the other reason for privacy. Being now ready, I began to feel shame of what I was doing, and, being too petulant and obstinate to give it up, I felt that a horse beneath me and the necessity of handling him in unwonted movements would do near as much to cover my shyness as the skirt I lacked.