Page:The Necromancer, or, The Tale of the Black Forest Vol. 1.djvu/156

 hastened to Volkert without telling a syllable of my design to my friends: The mysterious man smiled as I entered the room, and appeared to have a little more confidence in my honesty than when I paid him my first visit. I broke the business to him without circumlocution, and he seemed not unwilling to chastise the foreign officer for his want of courage, yet he endeavoured to make me sensible of the disagreeable consequences which likely would arise, if the transaction should transpire. I summoned up all my little rhetoric, and refuted his objections, by assuring him, that my friends would give him their word of honor never to betray him, and thus screen him from every disagreeable consequence; and that, if an unforeseen accident should unhappily make the transaction known, our joint interference should save him from punishment.

These arguments, accompanied by golden encouragements, conquered at last all his remaining fear; he promised to serve me at any