"It must have been the devil, then, after all, who has been here and carried them off!" cried Seaforth, staring full into Barney's face.
Mr. Maguire was not devoid of the superstition of his countrymen, but he looked as if he did not subscribe to the sequitur.
His master read incredulity in his countenance. "Why, I tell you, Barney, I put them there, on that arm-chair, when I got into bed; and, by Heaven! I distinctly saw the ghost of the old fellow they told me of, come in at midnight, put on my pantaloons, and walk away with them."
"Maybe so," was the cautious reply.
"I thought, of course, it was a dream; but then,—where the d—l are the breeches?"
The question was more easily asked than answered. Barney renewed his search, while the lieutenant folded his arms, and, leaning against the toilet, sunk into a reverie.
"After all, it must be some trick of my laughter-loving cousins," said Seaforth.
"Ah! then, the ladies!" chimed in Mr. Maguire, though the observation was not addressed to him; "and will it be Miss Caroline, or Miss Margaret, that's stole your honour's things?"
"I hardly know what to think of it," pursued the bereaved lieutenant, still speaking in soliloquy, with his eye resting dubiously on the chamber door. "I locked myself in, that's certain; and—but there must be some other entrance to the room—pooh! I remember—the private staircase: how could I be such a fool?" and he crossed the chamber to where a low oaken door-case was dimly visible in a distant corner. He paused before it. Nothing now interfered to screen it from observation; but it bore tokens of having been at some earlier period concealed by tapestry, remains of which yet clothed the walls on either side the portal.
"This way they must have come," said Seaforth; "I wish with all my heart I had caught them!"