He wrung his hands.
"Yes, yes! and I will make amends for it," I answered fiercely, as, hand on sword, I turned towards the door.
"Stay! whither go you?" cried my father.
"To seek this fellow out," I answered savagely. "To find him, and--to kill him."
"Then save yourself the trouble," rejoined my father firmly. "Two follies never made a wise thing yet, and never will. And this were rankest folly. For, look you, this fellow Ammon will be far away by now; aye, verily, perchance aboard ship, making for his master."
"Not so," said I, "for his master is already here in Lyme."
"What!" cried the old man, springing to his feet. "Ferguson in England?"
"Yes, he landed with Monmouth here to-night." And in a few hot, breathless words I told him all that I had seen and heard that day; while he paced to and fro, now stopping for a moment, now spreading out his hands, and all the time casting wild, hunted glances round the room.
"Michael," he said when I had finished, "the bolt is shot, and nothing now can save me from the gallows; nay, verily, I feel the noose about my neck already."
"No, no!" I cried out in my desperation. "Say not that. I cannot bear it. There is still hope that naught may come of it."