"If we were once out, there would not be much chance of our being detected, if we had something to put over our uniforms; but, of course, they would betray us to the first man we met."
"Yes, of course," O'Sullivan said; "but we might possibly obtain plain clothes at one of those small houses you speak of, though that would be risky."
"We might leave our coatees behind us, and go only in our shirts and breeches; and give out that we had been attacked, and robbed of our money and coats by footpads," Desmond said.
"That is a good idea," O'Neil agreed. "Yes, that might do, especially as, after dark, they would not be likely to notice that our breeches were of a French cut."
"But it seems to me that we are beginning at the wrong end of the business. It is of no use discussing what we are to do, when we escape, till we have settled upon the manner in which we are to get out. Let us talk over that first.
"Are the bars firmly in, O'Neil?"
O'Neil tried, with all his strength, to shake them.
"They are as firm as the walls," he said. "There is no getting them out, unless we have tools to cut away all the stonework round them."
"I suppose there is no chance of cutting through them?" O'Sullivan asked.
"There is not," O'Neil said. "We have not got such a thing as a knife about us. If we had, we could never saw through these thick bars; it would take a year of Sundays."