[Illustration: The streets were noisy with hawkers]

It was during this time of excitement that Katherine said one morning,
at breakfast, "Bram wait one minute for me. I am going to do an errand
or two for my mother.

"It is a bad time, Katherine, you have chosen," said Batavius. "Full of
men are the streets, excited men too, and of swaggering British
soldiers, whom it would be a great pleasure to tie up in a halter. The
British I hate,--bullying curs, everyone of them!"

"Well, I know that you hate the British, Batavius. You say so every
hour."

"Katherine!"

"That is so, Joanna."

Madam looked annoyed. Joris rose, and said, "Come then, Katherine, thou
shalt go with me and with Bram both. Batavius need not then fear for
thee."

His voice was so tender that Katherine felt an unusual happiness and
exultation; and she was also young enough to be glad to see the familiar
streets again, and to feel the pulse of their vivid life make her heart
beat quicker.

At Kip's store, Bram left her. She had felt so free and unremarked, that
she said, "Wait not for me, Bram. By myself I will go home. Or perhaps I
might call upon Miriam Cohen. What dost thou think?" And Bram's large,