"What's that you are saying?"
"Eh? good God! I'm saying that you are a republican, blue, dark-blue; and a true dark-blue is a fast color."
"That's not the question."
"What is it then?"
"I am talking of the strangers who assembled in this house last night between eight and nine o'clock."
"Well, suppose I did receive a few neighbors, suppose I even welcomed two strangers, where's the crime, general? I've got the Code at my fingers' ends,--unless, indeed, the old revolutionary law against suspected persons is revived."
"There is no crime in neighbors visiting you; but there is crime when those neighbors assemble for a conference in which an uprising and resort to arms is discussed."
"How can that be proved?"
"By the presence of the two strangers."
"Pooh!"