"Quarters in my house?—ye're a damned rebel spy!" he cried. "I'll denounce ye to my Lord for what ye are. Ho! ye rascals, I say!"
"Peace!" I commanded, sternly; "this is but child's folly. No man in the British army would arrest me at your behest. Ring the bell and summon your factor lawyer. I would have a word or two in private with both of you."
He dropped into a chair, and I could see the sweat standing in great beads on his wrinkled forehead.
"D' ye—d' ye mean to kill us both?" he gasped.
"Not if I can help it. But some better understanding is needful, and we will have it here and now, once for all. Will you ring, or shall I?"
He made no move to reach the bell-cord, and I rang for him. A grinning black boy came to the door, and seeing that Mr. Gilbert Stair was beyond giving the order, I gave it myself.
"Find Master Pengarvin and send him here quickly. Tell him Mr. Stair wants him."
There was a short interval of waiting and then the lawyer came. Being but a little wisp of a man, all malignance and no courage, he would have fled when he saw me. But I caught him by the collar and sent him scurrying around the table to keep his master company.
"Now, then; how much or how little have you two blabbed of the doings at Appleby Hundred some weeks since?" I demanded. "Speak out, and quickly."
'Twas the lawyer who obeyed, and now he was the trapped rat to snap blindly in despair.