“Good!” I said. “I hope that whoever has him won’t let him go.”
“He’s to be tried by court martial,” said Crossan, “on suspicion of being a spy.”
Godfrey actually haunts me. No sooner have I achieved a moment’s peace and quietness—with the greatest difficulty in the middle of a rebellion—than Godfrey breaks in on me. How he came to be in Belfast I could only dimly guess. It seemed likely that, having heard that a battle was going on, he came to the scene of it in the hope of pillage.
“I suppose,” I said, “they won’t actually hang him?”
“It was him, as your lordship is aware,” said Crossan, “that gave the first information to the Government.”
Crossan, in spite of the fact that he was a victorious general, preserved his peculiar kind of respect for my title. He did not, indeed, take off his hat when he entered the room, but that was only because soldiers, while on duty, never take off their hats.
“Don’t be absurd, Crossan,” I said. “You know perfectly well that he hasn’t intelligence enough to give anything but wrong information to any Government. What he told the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he wrote to him was that you were smuggling.”
“If your lordship doesn’t care to interfere—,” said Crossan.
“Can I help in any way?” said Bland.
He had been eating steadily and had finished the two crabs. I had not eaten more than three or four mouthfuls of game pie. I felt I might accept his offer.