you--an' if you'll just stand the trial I'm goin' to put you
to, I'll be a friend to you--the best you ever had too."

"Well, Charley," said the other, plucking up courage a little, for the
fellow was a thorough coward, "what is the thrial?"

"The man," continued Hanlon, "that betrayed you gave me one account of
what you're about; but whether he tould me thruth or not I don't know
till I hear another, an' that's yours. Now, you see clearly, Rody, that
I'm up to all as it is, so you need not be a bit backward in tellin' the
whole thruth. I say you're in danger, an' it's only trustin' to me--mark
that--by trustin' faithfully to me that you'll get out of it; an',
plaise the fates, I hope that, before three mouths is over, we'll be
both safe an' comfortable in America. Do you undherstand that? I had my
dhrames, Rody; but if I had, there must be nobody but yourself and me to
know them."

"It wasn't I that first thought of it, but Donnel Dhu," replied Kody; "I
never dreamt that he'd turn thraitor though."

"Don't be sayin' to-morrow or next day that I said he did," replied
Hanlon. "Do you mind me now? A nod's as good as a wink to a blind
horse."

Rody, though cowardly and treacherous, was extremely cunning, and upon
turning the matter over in his mind, he began to dread, or rather
to feel that Hanlon had so far over-reached him. Still it might be
possible, he thought, that the prophet had betrayed him, and he resolved
to put a query to his companion that would test his veracity; after
which he would leave himself at liberty to play a double game, if
matters should so fall out as to render it necessary.

"Did the man that tould you everything," he asked, "tell you the night
that was appointed for this business?"

Hanlon felt this was a puzzler, and that he might possibly commit
himself by replying in the affirmative.

"No," he replied, "he didn't tell me that."

"Ah, ha!" thought his companion, "I see whereabouts you are."

He disclosed, however, the whole plot, with the single exception of the
night appointed for the robbery, which, in point of date, he placed in
his narrative exactly a week after the real time.

"Now," he said to himself, "so far I'm on the safe side; still, if he
has humbugged me, I've paid him in his own coin. Maybe the whole haul,
as he calls it, may be secured before they begin to prepare for it."

Hanlon, however, had other designs. After musing a little, they
sauntered along the garden w