"What is this business? One cannot speak before your companion. He is a rattle-pated, silly fellow."
"But a very faithful one," answered Barecolt, doing the poor painter justice; "and he knows all about this affair already. But the matter is shortly this, my good friend!--A noble gentleman is here in Hull, having business with Sir John Hotham, and charged, moreover, by Lord Walton, to speak with you concerning Mistress Arrah Neil. He is my particular friend; and while he went on to the governor's house I went to the 'Swan,' requested by him to see you end fix a meeting for to-morrow morning. However, when he arrives at Sir John Hotham's, he finds no one but his son, Sir John being very ill----"
"Ah, by----! here's a pretty affair!" cried O'Donnell. "Very ill Sir John is not. He has got the gout in one foot and both hands, and is as cross as the yards of a ship; but his son takes all upon himself, and a base business he makes of it. What more? what more?"
"Why, the son causes this noble gentleman to be arrested immediately for a spy, tears his pass to pieces, will not let him see the governor, and threatens to shoot him to-morrow morning."
"And so he will, to be sure!" cried O'Donnell. "But what's to be done? How, in the fiend's name, can I help you? I'll not meddle with it--not a whit! I shall get shot some day myself if I don't mind."
As he was speaking, Diggory Falgate returned with two drinking-cups; and without waiting for Barecolt's reply, he tapped O'Donnell on the shoulder, saying--
"I'll tell you how you can help us, Master O'Donnell. Nothing so easy in life, and no danger to yourself either, though you are not a fellow to fear that if there were. All that is wanted is to let the governor know what is going on, and he'll soon stop the colonel's doings; for the pass which that wild beast tore was in his own handwriting; and it will be an eternal blot upon his honour--worse than a black bend sinister on the shield of his arms--if any harm happens to the earl after giving him that."
"The earl!" said O'Donnell. "Oh, ho! He is an earl, is he?"
"What have you said, you fool?" cried Barecolt, turning angrily upon Falgate; but the painter, though he turned somewhat red, put the best face he could upon it, saying--
"Well, it's a slip of the tongue, captain; but it can't be helped, and you know you can trust him."