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164 truth out of's maw, I'll warrant! Which way did he go, blockhead?"

"'Tis no matter for the boy!" cried Ben, in a voice of thunder. "'Tis for the man we must be looking! Do you, mates, search the yard and the shippens, while Ann and me'll do the bit of road, and the bushes in front yonder!"

"He'll be gotten clear away by this," grumbled Gardener Tom.

"Not he. 'Tis for spying he's come, and he'd not go back so soon, and with all of us about, too. Nay, he'll be on the premises still, somewheres, and, odds my life, we'll make short work of him when we find him. We'll tie him on the brown mare, and whip him till he swoons, and then we'll put his body down the Monks' Well that lies t'other side of the hill yonder."

Then the shrill, thin whining voice of Long Jack broke in upon the thunder of the others. Almost sobbing, and speaking in accents of real terror, he said, thickly, and with uncertain intonation—

"How now, mates, how now? Best leave well alone. Besht leave well alone, Oi say, and