"I have lost my mother," she said; "to lose you, too, would be more than I could bear, unless I were giving you for my country's good. But you can serve best by living rather than by courting danger. You must go, and go now!"
Meanwhile a British officer had been sent in advance of the troops to inquire for "Clark's parsonage." By mistake he asked for Clark's tavern, which news was brought to Hancock as he was debating whether to take Dorothy's advice or not. He waited no longer. With Adams he immediately took refuge in a thickly wooded hill back of the parsonage. An hour later Paul Revere returned to the house to report that after he left there, with two others, he had been captured by British officers. Having answered their questions evasively about the whereabouts of the patriots, he finally said: "Gentlemen, you have missed your aim; the bell's ringing, the town's alarmed. You are all dead men!" This so terrified the officers that, not one hundred yards further on, one of them mounted Revere's horse and rode off at top speed to give warning to the on-coming troops, while Revere went back to report to Hancock and Adams.
It was evidently unsafe for them to remain so near the scene of the struggle, and at daylight they were ready to start for the home of the Rev. Mr. Marrett in Woburn. Dorothy and Aunt Lydia were to remain in Lexington, and although they had kept well in the background through all the excitement of the fateful night, Aunt Lydia now went down to the door, not only to see the last of her beloved nephew, but to try to speak to some one who could give her more definite news of the seven hundred British soldiers who had arrived in town and were drawn up in formidable array against the motley company of colonists. The British officers at once commanded the colonists to lay down their arms and disperse. Not a single man obeyed. All stood in silent defiance of the order. Then the British regulars poured into the "minute-men" a fatal volley of shots; and about that time Aunt Lydia descended to the parsonage door, and excited Dorothy threw open her window that she might wave to her lover until he was out of sight. As she drew back, she saw something whiz through the air past her aunt's head, striking the barn door beyond, and heard her aunt exclaim: