"Nay, and if your honor says it, it must needs be true," the man—a bluff old soldier, with little pretensions to sanctity in his composition—answered with suppressed impatience; "and therefore I can only marvel that a maiden, known and esteemed by the family of worthy Major Hewitson, should not only have sought to cheat our vigilance by crossing the river privately in a boat, but should have done so in the company of a man whom I myself can testify to having been a chief of some repute in the army of the Irish enemy, having crossed swords with him at the battle of 'Knocknaclashy,' as I think they call it in their barbarous language, where he fought (I needs must own it) with a valor worthy of a better cause."
Major Ormiston turned, gravely but kindly, to Nellie.
"I fear me much," he said, "that you have been but ill-advised in all this business. Why not have presented yourself openly at the bridge if the matter which has brought you hither will bear investigation? and why, more than all the rest, have you come attended by a person whose very company must needs render you suspect yourself?"
"O sir!" said Nellie, weeping sadly, as she began to fear that even Henrietta's recommendation to mercy might perhaps avail her little; "we had not the password, without which we never should have been permitted to enter Dublin by the bridge; and our errand is, alas! of such a nature, that every moment lost is of deep and sad importance."
"Our errand," Ormiston thoughtfully repeated. "This errand, then, is not entirely your own, but is in some way or other interesting also to the man by whom Master Holdfast tells me you are accompanied."
"He should have said 'a gentleman,'" Nellie answered, with a slight rebuking emphasis on the latter word—"a gentleman who, at his own great trouble, and, I fear me, risk, has enabled me to accomplish this journey; in which, however, he has no other interest than such as any kind and noble heart might feel in the sorrows and perils of an unprotected girl."
"Where is he—this other prisoner?" Ormiston asked, turning for information to the corporal.
"In the gate-house, sir, where we have him safe under lock and key; for he was no prisoner to be left at large like this silly maiden, who begged so hard to be allowed to see the Lord-Deputy go by, that I found it not in my heart to deny her so small a favor; for the doing of which, I trust I have not incurred the displeasure either of your honor or of his highness the Lord Henry."
"Certainly not, honest Holdfast; you have acted both well and mercifully in all this business. And now lead the way to the gate-house, and trouble not your wits about this young maiden. I myself will be her surety that she attempt not to escape."