ad invoked. He had his remaining seven men to think of, and
he concluded that it was his duty under all the circumstances to bring
these off alive, and not procure their massacre by attempting fruitless
quixotries.

So "Forward!" roared the voice of Sergeant Flanagan, and forward went
the seven through the passage that had opened out before them in that
hooting, angry mob.

Beyond the convent walls they found fresh assailants awaiting them,
enemies these, who had not been soothed by the gentle, reassuring voice
of the abbess. But here there was more room to manoeuvre.

"Trot!" the sergeant commanded, and soon that trot became a gallop. A
shower of stones followed them as they thundered out of Tavora, and the
sergeant himself had a lump as large as a duck-egg on the middle of his
head when next day he reported himself at Pesqueira to Cornet O'Rourke,
whom he overtook there.

When eventually Sir Robert Craufurd heard the story of the affair, he
was as angry as only Sir Robert could be. To have lost four dragoons
and to have set a match to a train that might end in a conflagration was
reason and to spare.

"How came such a mistake to be made?" he inquired, a scowl upon his full
red countenance.

Mr. O'Rourke had been investigating and was primed with knowledge.

"It appears, sir, that at Tavora there is a convent of Dominican nuns as
well as a monastery of Dominican friars. Mr. Butler will have used the
word 'convento,' which more particularly applies to the nunnery, and so
he was directed to the wrong house."

"And you say the sergeant has reason to believe that Mr. Butler did not
survive his folly?"

"I am afraid there can be no hope, sir."

"It's perhaps just as well," said Sir Robert. "For Lord Wellington would
certainly have had him shot."

And there you have the true account of the stupid affair of Tavora,
which was to produce, as we shall see, such far-reaching effects upon
persons nowise concerned in it.

CHAPTER II. THE ULTIMATUM

News of the affair at Tavora reached Sir Terence O'Moy, the
Adjutant-General at Lisbon, about a week later in dispatches from
headquarters. These informed him that in the course of the humble
apology and explanation of the regrettable occurrence offered by the
Colonel of the 8th Dragoons in person to the Mother Abbess, it had
transpired that Lieutenant Butler had left the convent alive, but that
nevertheless he continued absent from his regiment.

Those dispatc