“Not likely,” replied the infantry officer, “seeing that he hasn’t the slightest idea that he’s inside of one. I’ve just been to the guard-house to have a look at him. He’s mad as a March hare; and wouldn’t know his own face in a looking-glass.”
“Mad! In what way?” asked Hancock and the others, who were yet but half enlightened about the circumstances of the mustanger’s capture.
“A brain fever upon him—delirious?”
“Is that why the guards have been doubled? Devilish queer if it is. The major himself must have gone mad!”
“Maybe it’s the suggestion—command I should rather say—of the majoress. Ha! ha! ha!”
“But what does it mean? Is the old maje really afraid of his getting out of the guard-house?”
“No—not that, I fancy. More likely an apprehension of somebody else getting into it.”
“Ah! you mean, that—”
“I mean that for Maurice the Mustanger there’s more safety inside than out. Some queer characters are about; and there’s been talk of another Lynch trial. The Regulators either repent of having allowed him a respite; or there’s somebody hard at work in bringing about this state of public opinion. It’s lucky for him that the old hunter has stood his friend; and it’s but a continuation of his good luck that we’ve returned so opportunely. Another day, and we might have found the guardhouse empty—so far as its present occupants are concerned. Now, thank God! the poor fellow shall have a fair trial.”
“When is it to take place?”