Page:Lady Barbarity; a romance (IA ladybarbarityrom00snai).pdf/274

 you have promised her my freedom. Be good enough to tell me, is that so?"

"Her ladyship is perfectly correct," he answered, and the mocking gleam in his eye I also took to be directed at me.

The prisoner paused at this and turned half round that he might regard our guilty faces together. I can never say whether it was that my colour changed ever so slightly, whether the faintest shade of compunction crossed the Captain's face, or whether the rebel was supernaturally endowed with wit, but suddenly his eyes were kindled with sparkles, and he turned almost savagely on me:

"Madam," he demanded, "what is the price that you are paying for this privilege?"

The sharp question pinned me helpless. And I was forced to recognise that evasion, if still expedient, was no longer possible. There was that power in him that tore the truth out of me, even as at an earlier time it had torn it out of Mrs. Emblem.

"I am to marry my dear friend, Captain Grantley," I told him, coolly.

He turned to that gentleman for a confirmation. It was promptly conveyed to him by means of a nod and a laugh.

"And you, sir, a subject of your King and a servant of his cause?" says the prisoner, tauntingly.

The Captain got up, smiling through his teeth.

"If, sir," says he, "you propose to preach a sermon on morality, I shall be glad to reach the Bible down."