The captain peered at Joseph over the rim of the ale pot he was just lifting to his mouth. The boy felt no resentment of the captain's hard bargain; indeed, he rather admired it. A man determined to succeed always had to make difficult choices, he was discovering. So it had been with the heroes of the Old Testament. Abraham. Moses. If he was to be like any man, it would be one of them.

"Well, Hazard, what's your answer?"

"You haven't told me how long I'll be a servant."

Captain Smollet grinned admiringly. "Some are so lathered with excitement — or so guilty over past crimes" — Joseph kept his face absolutely calm, ignoring the probe — "they clean forget to ask till we're on our way down the estuary." He eyed the contents of his drinking pot. "The indenture is seven years."

At first Joseph wanted to shout no. But he didn't. Smollet took his silence for refusal, shrugged, and rose, throwing coins on the soiled table.

Being bound to another man as a slave for seven years wouldn't be easy, Joseph thought. Yet he could use that time wisely and profitably. Educate himself, both generally, as Giles had urged, and in every aspect of his chosen trade. After seven years he would be a free man, in a new land where there was a need for ironmasters, and where no one had ever heard of Thad Windom.

At the inn door, Captain Smollet stopped when he heard, "I'll sign."

Rain was falling that evening when Joseph hurried along a wharf toward the Gull of Portsmouth. Light glowed in the windows of the captain's quarters at the stem. How bright and inviting it looked. In that cabin Joseph would shortly make his mark on the articles of indenture.