"Here's the oath," he said. "We swear to stand any torture and submit in silence to any death rather than betray our secret and our king. We will obey in silence and in secret. We will swim through seas of blood and fight our way through lakes of fire, if we are ordered. Nothing shall bar our way. All we do and say and think is for our country and our king. If any of you have anything to say, speak out before you take the oath."
He saw Marco move a little, and he made a sign to him.
"You," he said. "Have you something to say?"
Marco turned to him and saluted.
"Here stand ten men for Samavia. God be thanked!" he said. He dared say that much, and he felt as if his father himself would have told him that they were the right words.
The Rat thought they were. Somehow he felt that they struck home. He reddened with a sudden emotion.
"Squad!" he said. "I'll let you give three cheers on that. It's for the last time. We'll begin to be quiet afterward."
And to the Squad's exultant relief he led the cheer, and they were allowed to make as much uproar as they liked. They liked to make a great deal, and when it was at an end, it had done them good and made them ready for business.
The Rat opened the drama at once. Never surely had there ever before been heard a conspirator's whisper as hollow as his.
"Secret Ones," he said, "it is midnight. We meet in the depths of darkness. We dare not meet by day. When we meet in the daytime, we pretend not to know each other. We are meeting now in a Samavian city where there is a fortress. We shall have to take it when the secret sign is given and we make our rising. We are getting everything ready, so that, when we find the king, the secret sign can be given."