"To-morrow at high noon," was the answer.
"It is as safe a place as any. Thank your honored father and yourself. I will be there."
"What does that mean?" asked Andrew, as we went on. "Why should that old fellow be so wonderfully pleased at being asked about a place to store the apples?"
"Hush!" said I, speaking English, which I now did quite perfectly. "You must learn not to talk so loud."
"I am like to lose the use of my tongue altogether, if I stay long in this country," said he discontentedly. "Well, cousin, I will squeak like a rere-mouse, if that will content you. But what does it mean?"
I explained the matter, taking care to speak in English, and in a low tone.
"So that was it," said he, in a tone of wonder mixed with compassion. "And will the old man really leave his bed at midnight, and risk not only the rheumatism but his life, on such an errand as that?"
"Yes, indeed, and his wife also, though she is very infirm," said I. "We of the Religion are used to such risks."
"I wonder what one of the farmers in our parish at Tre Madoc would say to such an invitation?" was Andrew's comment. "But what if you should be discovered?"
"Then we should be shot down like wolves, or carried away no one knows where. Such things happen every day."