"Hark you, Captain," said the Proprietary, as his visiters were about to take their leave—"if you have a scruple in this matter and are so inclined, I would have you confer with Father Pierre. Whether this adventure require prayer, or weapon of steel, you shall judge for yourself."
"I shall take it, my Lord, as a point of soldiership," said Dauntrees, "to be dealt with, in soldierly fashion—that is, with round blows if occasion serves. I ask no aid from our good priest. He hath a trick—if I may be so bold as to speak it before your Lordship—which doth not so well sort with my age and bodily health,—a trick, my Lord, of putting one to a fasting penance by way of purification. Our purpose of visiting the Black House would be unseasonably delayed by such a purgation."
"As thou wilt—as thou wilt!" said the Proprietary, laughing; "Father Pierre would have but an idle sinecure, if he had no other calling but to bring thee to thy penitentiary.—Good even, friends,—may the kind saints be with you!"
The Captain and his comrade now turned their steps toward the fort, and the Proprietary retired into the mansion. Here he found the secretary and Benedict Leonard waiting his arrival. They had just returned from the town, whither they had gone after doing their errand to the fort. Albert Verheyden bore a packet secured with silken strings and sealed, which he delivered to the Proprietary.
"Dick Pagan, the courier," he said, "has just come in from James Town in Virginia, whence he set forth but four days ago—he has had a hard ride of it—and brought this pacquet to the sheriff for my Lord. The courier reports that a ship had just arrived from England, and that Sir Henry Chichely the governor gave him this for your Lordship to be delivered without delay."
The Proprietary took the pacquet: "Albert," he said, as he was about to withdraw, "I have promised the old ranger, Arnold de la Grange, a new cap. Look to it:—get him the best that you may find in the town—or, perhaps, it would better content him to have one made express by Cony the leather dresser. Let it be as it may best please the veteran himself, good Albert." With this considerate remembrance of the ranger, Lord Baltimore withdrew into his study.
CHAPTER V.
—-deep on his front engraven,
Deliberation sat, and public care.
Milton.