nderstand that a stranger should be treated with
civility. There was sense enough among the rest to recognise that
Maurice was not the kind of man whom it would be safe to bully. The girl
returned and informed Maurice that his groom was in the kitchen, but
refused to attend him.

Maurice rose and sought the man himself. The reason of the refusal was
sufficiently obvious. The kitchen was full of troopers who had advanced
much further on the way to absolute drunkenness than their officers.
James, Lord Dunseveric's groom, was decidedly the most drunken of the
party, but Maurice wanted the man, and was prepared to take some trouble
to reduce him to a condition of serviceableness again. He grasped him
by the collar of the coat, and pushed him through the back door into the
yard. A delighted stable boy worked the pump handle while Maurice held
the groom under the stream of cold water. The cure was ineffective.
Maurice walked him up and down the yard for half an hour, and then put
him under the pump again. The man remained obstinately drunk. Maurice
flung him down in a corner of a stable and left him.

He returned to the room where the feasters sat, and looked in. The
company had advanced rapidly since he had seen them last. The squire who
had proposed the toast was under the table. Several others were lying
back helplessly in their chairs. Those who could talk were talking
loud and all together. The amount of liquor still to be consumed was
considerable. Maurice smiled. These officers and gentlemen were little
likely to interfere with anything he chose to do at midnight. He went
out of doors and sat on the stone bench in front of the inn.

He had no plan in his head for the rescue of Neal Ward, only he was
quite determined to accomplish it somehow before morning. He did not
even know where his friend was imprisoned, or how he was guarded. His
father had spoken of a cellar somewhere in the inn. He supposed that foe
would sooner or later be able to find it, overpower the sentry, and set
Neal free. In the meanwhile, he had nothing to do but wait.

He felt a touch on his shoulder, and looked round to see the girl, the
inn servant, standing beside him.

"You're the gentleman," she whispered, "that was speaking till the young
man here the morn--the young man that I give the basket to, that is a
friend o' Jemmy Hope's?"

Maurice recollected the incident very well.

"He's here the now," whispered the girl again. "He's down in