“Had I come better attended, Captain Borroughcliffe might have heard these questions, instead of putting them.”
“I am happy, sir, that your retinue has been so small: and yet even the rebel schooner called the Ariel might have furnished you with a more becoming attendance. I cannot but think that you are not far distant from your friends.”
“He is near his enemies, your honor,” said Sergeant Drill, who had entered the room unobserved; “for here is a boy who says he has been seized in the old ruin, and robbed of his goods and clothes; and, by his description, this lad should be the thief.”
Borroughcliffe signed to the boy, who stood in the background, to advance; and he was instantly obeyed, with all that eagerness which a sense of injury on the part of the sufferer could excite. The tale of this unexpected intruder was soon told, and was briefly this:
He had been assaulted by a man and a boy (the latter was in presence), while arranging his effects, in the ruin, preparatory to exhibiting them to the ladies of the abbey, and had been robbed of such part of his attire as the boy had found necessary for his disguise, together with his basket of valuables. He had been put into an apartment of an old tower, by the man, for safe keeping; but as the latter frequently ascended to its turret, to survey the country, he had availed himself of this remissness, to escape; and, to conclude, he demanded a restoration of his property, and vengeance for his wrongs.
Merry heard his loud and angry details with scornful composure, and before the offended peddler was through his narrative, he had divested himself of the borrowed garments, which he threw to the other with singular disdain.
“We are beleaguered, mine host! beset! besieged!” cried Borroughcliffe, when the other had ended. “Here is a rare plan to rob us of our laurels! ay, and of our rewards! but, hark ye, Drill! they have old soldiers to deal with, and we shall look into the matter. One would wish to triumph on foot; you understand me?—there was no horse in the battle. Go, fellow, I see you grow wiser; take this young gentleman—and remember he is a young gentleman—put him in safe keeping, but see him supplied with all he wants.”
Borroughcliffe bowed politely to the haughty bend of the body with which Merry, who now began to think himself a martyr to his country, followed the orderly from the room.
“There is mettle in the lad!” exclaimed the captain; “and if he live to get a beard, 'twill be a hardy dog who ventures to pluck it. I am glad, mine host, that this 'wandering Jew' has arrived, to save the poor fellow's feelings, for I detest tampering with such a noble spirit. I saw, by his eye, that he had squinted oftener over a gun than through a needle!”
“But they have murdered my kinsman!—the loyal, the learned, the ingenious Mr. Christopher Dillon!”