"Very well, my Lord."
At this moment the old sergeant entered the room and saluted the admiral.
"A French officer, wich he says he's from the American Continental squadron, has come ashore in a small cutter, under a flag of truce, an' desires to speak with your Lordship. He asks for a safe-conduct."
"Tell him he shall return as freely as he came, on the word of a British officer, and admit him."
A slender, dapper little man, in the brilliant uniform of a French marine officer, his head covered with a powdered wig, entered the room a moment later, and bowed profoundly. Elizabeth started violently as she beheld him.
"Whom have I the honor of addressing?" asked the admiral.
"The Vicomte de Chamillard, a colonel of marines in the navy of France, serving as a volunteer in the American squadron," was the reply.
"And you come on behalf of--"
"Captain John Paul Jones, to protest against your unlawful detention of another French officer, the Marquis de Richemont, my Lord."
"He is a spy, caught in the very act: he has admitted it; and if that were not enough, I find he is an attainted traitor. A court is ordered for to-morrow morning on the Serapis; his execution, which will be inevitable, is set for half after six o'clock in the evening; he shall hang from one of the frigate's yard-arms."