Stephen could not forbear grinning at these words, but strove to hide the smile behind his hand. He and young John Thorndyke had spread the news broadcast the night before, so that, although none were willing to help him in his resistance to the law, every man was ready with an excuse when summoned to cut down Master Simon’s tree.
“Now,” cried the Sergeant to his men, “let us have no more delay. Come, fellows, ply your axes.” Both of the men hung back and the older of them spoke determinedly.
“Nay,” he said, “you did not tell us that this was the tree we were to cut. All of the town knows of this great pine and of Master Simon who planted it. Not for a score of gold pieces would I lay axe to its trunk. So here is the money you gave us; we have altered our minds and will do no work for you this day.”
Having spoken, he shouldered his axe and trudged sturdily away, followed by his companion, neither of them regarding the heated remonstrances of Sergeant Branderby.
“A pest on you all,” he shouted. “A Spanish mule is not more stubborn than a New Englander. But think not your tree is to be spared. I will even hew it down myself.”
For that purpose the good Sergeant required an axe which he procured easily enough by riding after the departing workmen and presenting one of his great horse-pistols to the younger man’s head.
“Let him have the axe, Jonas,” said the elder. “If he tries to hew down the tree on this hot day he will burst a blood-vessel, and Heaven be praised if he does.”
Leading his horse and holding the tool in plainly unaccustomed hands, the Sergeant came back to the foot of the pine. Here, however, a new complication had presented itself, one that made Branderby’s face flush a deeper red with helpless fury.
“Come down, you wicked lad,” he roared. “Come down this moment or harm will come to you, I vow.”
But Stephen, who had scrambled up among the lower branches, looked down at him in mocking defiance. There was a certain kindliness in Branderby’s weatherbeaten face that made him almost certain that the soldier, angry as he was, would not cut down a tree with a boy clinging among its boughs.
“If the tree falls, I fall with it,” he called, “so ply your axe if you dare.”