“Ah, that’s just it, sir! He—that’s the cap’n—swears ’at you’ve been and blowed on him; and on the rest of us. Of course, Uncle Donald knew better, and so did I; but what’s the use of our saying anything against him? He swears ’at you’ve blowed, and now he’s goin’ to have vengeance.”
The boy paused at this point, and looked up into Percy’s face, as though waiting for a reply. Evidently, he expected a disclaimer. At all events, the young man knew that it would greatly please him to receive one, and he gave it at once, and emphatically.
“Guy—Ralph Tryon lies if he says so! and I believe he knows he lies! Now, tell me, what does he propose to do?”
“That’s what we don’t know, sir; but Uncle Donald says you must keep an eye on your mother. It’s a hard thing to say—dreadful hard to tell a man to beware of his own mother—but so it is. It’s to her the cap’n has been; and uncle overheard enough between ’em to be very sure ’at mischief is meant to yourself, sir!”
“How did your uncle happen to overhear this? Where did it happen?”
“At the cottage, sir, to-day. The cap’n came aboard the brig about midnight—the last that ever was. The lookout heard him call for a boat, and uncle went off and got him. This forenoon he went ashore, and Uncle Donald with him; and they went up to the cottage; and while the cap’n was tellin’ his story to Mistress Margery, Donald went out; and they must have thought he’d gone further away. I s’pose, if the truth was told, he was list’nin’. I wish you could see the old man; but he can’t leave the brig; and he says it wouldn’t do for you to come there.”
“Can you tell me anything that was said?” Percy asked eagerly.
“Only this, sir. Of course, my uncle didn’t dare to get too near. If they’d caught him, there’s no telling what might have happened. He heard Cap’n Tryon tell the mistress how that you had betrayed ’em—the whole lot of ’em—to the sheriff or the constable. What the mistress said he couldn’t exactly hear; but he could tell that she sided in with the cap’n. After awhile the cap’n said something about clappin’ a stopper on ye—on the young spy and informer, he called ye.”
“And what said my mother to that?”
“That was what Donald tried awful hard to find out but he couldn’t do it. Howsumever, he’s sure she agreed to it. She didn’t say she’d help, but it was understood that she shouldn’t stand in the way of what the other would do.”