Arnold laughed. “We won’t go into that! I’ve sold drugs myself!” To Nason he said impatiently: “Who are the others?”

Nason spoke proudly. “This here’s Nathaniel Merrill, brother to Cap’n Peter. He went to Harvard College, and can talk like an Englishman so you wouldn’t know the difference. He’s been supercargo with Cap’n Peter. Next to him’s Tom Bickford of Arundel. He’ll catch fish where there aren’t any, and track deer across solid rock. He wanted to go to Harvard and be a minister, but his family sent him to sea.”

“Seaman or officer?” Arnold asked.

Tommy smiled his polite smile. “I can navigate, sir, but I never had a vessel of my own. First mate, I was.”

Arnold’s eyes glittered in the candlelight, and he hitched forward in his chair to look at Verrieul. “And what does this young man do? Anything unusual?”

“Well, you might say so,” Nason admitted. “His name’s Joseph Marie Verrieul, and he went to Dartmouth College. He speaks French, Iroquois, Abenaki and Chippeway, and can make orations in all of ’em.”

“Not Dartmouth College!” Arnold protested. “Why, it was only ten years ago that I contributed the profits of a sea-venture toward the establishment of that institution! Surely such an investment can’t be showing a return!” He laughed silently; and in the wavering glow his rounded face took on a lean, satirical look. He was pleased with Nason’s men: no doubt of that; and I certainly would have counted myself fortunate if, in an hour of need, I could have had them on any vessel of mine.

“All right,” Arnold said. “You’re scouts, all of you. I sent Nason to Arundel to get good scouts, and I believe he’s got ’em. I’ve heard a lot, up here, from Pennsylvanians and Virginians and Jerseymen, about what cowards New Englanders are: how they’re no good—not to be depended on. Personally, being one myself, I don’t hold with their ideas.”

He eyed us from under arched brows. Cap Huff cleared his throat with the sound of a brig rubbing barnacles from a wharf.

“Yes,” Arnold went on. “They say you New Englanders are cowards—ignorant bumpkins who never do as you’re told; and I must admit I come across a few answering to that description—a few! I’m just back from clearing up a mess two of ’em made! Bedel and Butterfield!”

The very thought threw him into a passion. He hissed contemptuously, leaped to his feet to glare at us; then threw himself into his chair once more.

“Heart-breaking poltroonery! Shameful! By God, I can’t believe it yet! Two weeks thrown away, trying to salvage four hundred soldiers, surrendered by those two capons—those two she-rabbits!” He thumped the desk and seemed about to burst with rage.