aking like a loyal officer of the king, Sir Henry,
and that if I did my duty I should arrest you at once on a charge of
high treason."

"And get my head chopped off, eh, Hilary? Rather comical that would be,
my boy, for a prisoner to arrest his visitor, and keep him in prison
with him; but how would you manage to give him up to the law?"

Hilary bit his lip. Certainly it did seem laughable for him, a
prisoner, to talk in such a way as that, and he felt vexed, and looked
uneasily at his visitor; but he brightened up directly as he felt that
he had shown his loyalty to the king he served.

"So you believe in the Dutchman, Hilary?"

"I don't understand you, Sir Henry," said the young man.

"I say you believe in the Dutchman--the man you call George the Second--
the Pretender."

"I do not believe in the Pretender," exclaimed Hilary quickly.

"Don't quibble, my boy," said Sir Henry smiling. "You call my sovereign
the Pretender, and that is what I call the man you serve. Good heavens,
boy! how could you devote your frank young life to such a service?"

Hilary had finished all he wanted of the chicken, and he sat and gazed
in the baronet's face.

"Well," said the latter, "what are you thinking?"

"I was thinking, Sir Henry, how much better it would be if we were both
to speak out frankly. Now, what do you mean?"

"What do I mean?" said Sir Henry thoughtfully.

He stopped and remained thinking.

"I'll tell you what you mean, Sir Henry, if you like," said Hilary.
"You have come here now, secure in your power, if you like to call it
so, and you are going to try and win me over by soft words to join the
other cause."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Sir Henry, changing his ground. "I did not say
anything to make you think such a thing as that."

Hilary saw that he had made a mistake, and he, too, withdrew his
argumentative position.

"Perhaps I am wrong then," he said.

"Presumably, Hilary. Why, my good boy, of what value would you be to
us? I said what I did only out of compassion."

This nettled Hilary, who, boylike, had no little idea of his importance
in the world.

"Oh, no, my dear boy, I only felt a little sorry; and as to being in my
power, really I have no power whatever here. I am, as I told you, only
a visitor."

"On the Pretender's business," said Hilary sharply.

"I did not say so," replied Sir Henry quietly. "But come, suppose we
two enemies, in a political sense, leave off fencing and come, d