"Ay, he lived honestly, your father," he muttered at last. "It is true, my lass. I grant it. But he had a fair wind, had Alan, and a short course; and if he had lived to be sixty, God knows! We are what we are made. I mind him well, and the burn we fished and the pickle things we took out, and your mother that played with us in her cutty sark, and not a shoe between us nor a bodle of money; but the green hills round us, and all we knew of the world that it lay beyond them. And that was all your father ever knew, my lass. And well for him! Ay, well for him! But woe's me, and woe to the man who took my living, and woe to the evil King!"
His voice was beginning to rise; in a moment he would have reached his usual pitch of denunciation, of which even now some of his many writings afford a pale reflection; but at the word King there came a sharp knocking at the door, and he paused. For me, I turned in a panic, and, heedless what noise I made, hurried up the stairs. The steps creaked under me, but fortunately the knocking was repeated so quickly and persistently that it covered the sound of my flight; and before I had more than ensconced myself in the old place, Ferguson, doubtless in obedience to some signal, was at the door and had opened it.
Immediately half-a-dozen men poured noisily in, breathing hard and growling in low tones, and passed into the room below. But until the outer door was closed and secured, nothing I could catch, though fear sharpened my ears, was said. Then, as Ferguson went in after them, one of the newcomers raised his voice in answer to a question, and cried with a rattling oath, "What is up? What is up, old fox? Why, all is up! And we'll all swing for it before the month is over, if we cannot clear out to-night! You are a clever one, Mr. Ferguson, but you are caught this time, with better men. God! if I had the sneak here that peached on us, I would cut his liver out! I would----"
Two or three voices joined in to the same tune and drowned his words, one asking where Prendergast was, another where Porter was, a third indulging in threats so horrid and blasphemies so profane that I turned cold where I crouched. I began to understand what had happened, and my situation; but that nothing might be spared me Ferguson, in a quavering voice that proved all was news to him, asked again what was the matter.
"The Blues are moved," cried three or four at once. "They were marching out when we left. The guards at Kensington are doubled, and the orders for the King's hunting to-morrow are cancelled. They were hurrying to and fro calling the Council when we came away, and messengers were beginning to go round the taverns."
"And they have seized the horses at the King of Bohemia's Head," added another, "so they know a lot."
"But is it--certain?" Ferguson asked, with a break in his voice.
"Ay, as certain as that we shall hang if we do not get over!" was the brutal answer.
"And the Captain?"
"I have been at his lodgings. He has not been heard of since noon. He ordered his horse then and they say took the road; and hell to it, if that is so, he is half way to France by this! And safe! Safe, you devils, and we are left here caught like rats!"