"If a fellow says a word to you, it is repeated to all the world. I never would have you joined with me in a secret. You are a great deal worse than—, well, those fellows that you abuse me about. They never tell anything that they have heard among themselves, to people outside."
"Pat Carroll, you mean?" asked the Captain.
"He isn't the only one. There's more in it than him."
"Oh yes; we know that. There were many others in it besides Pat Carroll, when they let the waters in through the dyke gates. There must have been twenty there."
"No, there weren't—not that I saw."
"A dozen, perhaps?"
"You are laying traps for me, but I am not going to be caught. I was there, and I did see it. You may make the most of that. Though you have me up before the judge, I needn't say a word more than I please."
"He is more obstinate," said his father, "than any rebel that you can meet."
"But so mistaken," said the Captain, "because he can refuse to answer us who are treating him with such tenderness and affection, who did not even want to wound his feelings more than we can help, he thinks that he can hold his peace in the same fashion, before the entire court; and that he can do so, although he has owned that he knows the men."
"I have never owned that," said the boy.