"Why should I sign this?"
"Sir!" said the attorney in surprise.
"Why should I sign this? What have I to do with Christopher Butler or John Feggans?"
The lawyer looked round at the other man as though asking whether he had heard aright.
"I am at a loss to give you better reasons than you know already. Who should sign it if not you?"
"I am afraid I must trouble you to explain. See, I find that Christopher Butler, having incurred debts to a large amount, has assigned these debts to John Feggans, who has paid them, and that Christopher Butler indentures himself a slave to John Feggans, to win his release by working in the Plantations. I ask you, what have I to do with all this?"
"Christopher Butler asks that?"
"Who? What did you say?"
"Christopher Butler—yourself."
Harry laughed, so great was his sense of relief. It was all a mistake, then; he had been seized by mistake for some poor wretched fellow who had lost all his money and been forced to adopt this, the last resource of impecunious spendthrifts.