Page:Mistress Madcap (1937).pdf/182

 "I—why, Hitty, I" she began.

"Nay," interrupted Mehitable tenderly, with a fleeting glance over her shoulder at the grim-faced man who was following them with his musket over his shoulder. "Nay, do not bother thee, Charity! All will yet be well."

And then, as though to verify this hopeful expression, after they had reëntered the Debtors' Prison and were once more in Provost Marshal Cunningham's presence, it seemed to the girl that things would be right, indeed. For there, beside the captain's table, with a beautiful lady standing beside him, was the smiling faced, broad-shouldered friend of her Trenton visit, Lieutenant Freeman!

The lady, a saucy smile on her red lips and a twinkle in her lov'ely eyes, was speaking to the provost marshal as they approached with their guard. Captain Cunningham was plainly carried away by her charm and sat fumbling embarrassedly among his papers on the table as he listened to her merry banter.

"I vow, Captain," the lady was laughing, "I shall strike your name from my dance list an you imprison any more of my friends in your dreadful old Bridewell. And how do you do, Hitty, my dear!" Smilingly, she turned and saluted Mehitable familiarly by her name, as though she had known her all of her life. "And Charity, too!" For a fleeting instant, grave concern showed in her face as she noted the younger girl's feverish color and the blank look in her eyes; but she was all gay flattery and jollity as she turned back to the cruel-looking man behind the table.