Page:The Unspeakable Gentleman (IA unspeakablegent00marq).pdf/250

 "Ah Lawton," he said. "Is it possible that you did not know it? Can it be that you do not understand? Poor Sims is dead, Lawton, a brave man, but not of good physique. The evening was quite too much for him. Do not take it so hard, man! We all must die, you among the rest. You should have known me better, Lawton. You should have known I would not allow myself to be taken prisoner."

"What!" shouted Mr. Lawton. "What the devil are you then?"

The scene appeared to move my father, for he sighed again, and paused, the better to enjoy it.

"Only a poor man," he said, "only a poor chattel of the Lord's, a poor frail jug that has gone too often to the well. A poor man of a blackened reputation, who has been set upon by spies of France, and threatened in his own house, but who has managed to escape—" and his voice became sharp and hard.

"Take Mr. Lawton's pistol, Ned."

There fell a moment's silence in the room while my father, a little in advance of the rest of us, stared fixedly into my uncle's eyes.

"Set upon by spies," he said, "persecuted