Page:Lady Barbarity; a romance (IA ladybarbarityrom00snai).pdf/241

 "Ods wounds!" he cries, "how came these in your custody?"

"An accident hath occurred to that emissary of yours," I repeated, and smiled upon his urgent face, "and you shall hear the details of it on condition that you do confess why this packet is a bogus. I can assure you, Captain, that I am burning to learn the reason for this make-believe."

He tried to hedge at this, and get news of the Corporal out of me without giving me the secret that I so desired. But if he considered I was a child in these affairs to be evaded lightly he was early undeceived.

"Not a word, not a hint, sir," I says, "until you have told me why you have furnished the Government with such a short account. And I am persuaded, sir, that that Corporal of yours is in the least enviable plight."

My reluctant enemy fenced with me a long half hour, but I was so tenacious of my course, and parried him with such an ease, that in the end I forced him to desist.

"Very well," he said, "I'll tell you, madam. The fact is I have been trying to intimidate you. There has been a conspiracy between his lordship and myself to frighten you into a betrayal of the prisoner. From the first I have been convinced that you could put your hand upon that rebel if you cared, and, my dear lady, it may please you now to know that up to this instant I have not budged one point from that opinion. I am certain that if