"Stuff! Let them send me to Coventry if they will. I don't believe there is any truth in the rumour, and we don't part like that. Didn't you save my life in the smugglers' battle, and I'm going to stick to you through all this Coventry business. Put it there," and Dick stretched his great hand across the study table and grasped the hand of Ande and shook it warmly. There was a grateful look in the latter's eyes.
"You have done too many things for me, to turn in with a rabble like that. You have changed old Dullhead into a brighter man, and made him Old Ironsides, and we'll let them know that Old Ironsides is going to stick to you. Why, Ande, you and I could clean out the whole crew in a personal fight on the Bowling Green, and—zounds! I'd like to do it."
"And they would gain their desires. We'd be expelled."
"Never thought of that."
"It's what would happen, though."
There was silence in the study for the space of half an hour, during which they laboured on the coming lessons. Then, it was Dick, who broke the silence.
"How did it happen that the idea of treason got out. I don't believe it, but I'm a bit curious."
"It's a long story, but I'll tell you some day, Dick, and let you see some documents that I have still in my possession. There's the gong."
A deep sound of a gong, indicating the dinner hour in the dining-room below, broke the silence, and they hurried forth to its summons.
After the discovery of Dick, and the encounter with Creakle, neither he nor Ande sought the games of the others. If they needed recreation, they took it in long walks along the sea-coast or in the country. The enmity of Creakle and Tenny was shown in many petty ways. They were not content with sending to Cov entry alone. Once, on their return, they found a placard on their study door with the sentence of, "The Home of Treason," written on it, but this did not stir the wrath of Ande as much as a later placard, a rude sketch of a soldier with red hair, hands bound, eyes blindfolded, and before him a file of soldiers with weapons presented, ready to fire, and near at hand a grave and a coffin. With a burst of passion, he tore it down and ground it under his heel.