"First to thank you, sir, for your kindness, which I know I don't deserve. Sherebiah Minshull has treated me well."
"I'm glad of that. Now is there anything else I can do for you?"
"I've been thinkin', these few days, sir, and ponderin' on my past life; and there's a thing I believe you ought to know."
"Well, speak up, man."
"'Tis summat I heard pass between Cap'n Aglionby and the Frenchman, sir."
"That's enough: I'm not interested in the doings of your rascally employer."
"But you are, sir, unless I be much mistaken. The matter concerns the French lady near Breda, and the young mistress—partickler the young mistress, sir."
Harry was now all attention.
"Speak on then, and use few words."
Simmons then related that, some few days before the battle of Blenheim, Monsieur de Polignac had come secretly into the camp and paid a visit to Aglionby. (Harry remembered the letter making the appointment he had found in the castle.) The opening of the interview had been stormy; Aglionby had accused Polignac of being a party to the attempt on his life at Breda, and at first refused to accept his assurances that he knew nothing whatever of the matter. But Polignac spoke him fairly, declaring that his connection with Mr. Berkeley had been limited to planning Aglionby's rescue from prison. The Captain's suspicions being at last lulled, Polignac opened up the subject of his visit. Of the remainder of the interview Simmons had but hazy ideas: he had listened through a hole in Aglionby's tent, and the conversation being conducted in low tones and in French, of which he had only a smattering, he had missed a good deal of it. But he had heard enough to know that the Mademoiselle of whom the two spoke was Mademoiselle de Vaudrey, and that Polignac was bargaining with Aglionby to aid him in an attempt to get possession of the young lady.