“Officers, do your duty!”
Fry and Hodges advanced upon Mr. Eden, but before they could get at him the huge body of Evans interposed itself. The man was pale but doggedly resolved.
“Mustn't lay a finger on his reverence,” said he, almost in a whisper, but between his clinched teeth and with the look of a bulldog over a bone.
“What, do you rebel against me, Evans?”
“No, sir,” answered Evans softening his tone, “but nobody must affront his reverence. Look here, sir, his reverence knows a great deal more than I do, and he says this is against the law. He showed you the Act, and you couldn't answer him except by violence, which ain't no answer at all. Now I am the servant of the law, and I know better than go against the law.”
“There, I want no more of your chat. Loose the prisoner.”
“Seems to me he is loosed,” said Fry.
“Go to the 5-lb. crank, Josephs, and let me see how much you can do in half an hour.”
“That I will, your reverence,” and off he ran.
“Now, sir,” said Hawes sternly, “I put up with this now because it must end next week. I have written to the visiting justices, and they will settle whether you are to be master in the jail or I.”