"Yes, we should, Edward; but recollect that we are not yet men, and boys of fifteen and thirteen can not do much, although they may wish to do much."
"It's true that I am only fifteen," replied Edward, "but I am strong enough, and so are you. I think if I had a fair cut at a man's head I would make him stagger under it, were he as big as a buffalo. As young as I have been to the wars, that I know well; and I recollect my father promising me that I should go with him as soon as I was fifteen."
"What puzzles me," replied Humphrey, "is, the fear that old Jacob has of our being seen at Lymington."
"Why, what fear is there?"
"I can not tell more than you; in my opinion, the fear is only in his own imagination. They surely would not hurt us (if we walked about without arms like other people) because our father had fought for the king? That they have beheaded some people it is true, but then they were plotting in the king's favor, or in other ways opposed to Parliament. This I have gathered from Jacob: but I can not see what we have to fear if we remain quiet. But now comes the question, Edward, for Jacob has, I believe, said more to me on one subject than he has to you. Suppose you were to leave the forest, what would be the first step which you would take?"
"I should, of course, state who I was, and take possession of my father's property at Arnwood, which is mine by descent."
"Exactly; so Jacob thinks, and he says that would be your ruin, for the property is sequestered, as they call it, or forfeited to the Parliament, in consequence of your father having fought against it on the king's side. It no longer belongs to you, and you would not be allowed to take it: on the contrary, you would, in all probability, be imprisoned, and who knows what might then take place? You see there is danger."
"Did Jacob say this to you?"
"Yes, he did: he told me he dare not speak to you on the subject, you were so fiery; and if you heard that the property was confiscated, you would certainly do some rash act, and that any thing of the kind would be a pretense for laying hold of you; and then he said that he did not think that he would live long, for he was weaker every day; and that he only hoped his life would be spared another year or two, that he might keep you quiet till better times came. He said that if they supposed that we were all burned in the house when it was fired, it would give them a fair opportunity of calling you an impostor and treating you accordingly, and that there were so many anxious to have a gift of the property, that you would have thousands of people compassing your death. He said that your making known yourself and claiming your property would be the very conduct that your enemies would wish you to follow, and would be attended with most fatal consequences; for he said, to prove that you were Edward Beverley, you must declare that I and your sisters were in the forest with him, and this disclosure would put the whole family in the power of their bitterest enemies; and what would become of your sisters, it would be impossible to say, but most likely they would be put under the charge of some Puritan family who would have a pleasure in ill-treating and humiliating the daughters of such a man as Colonel Beverley."
"And why did he not tell me all this?"