Brown?"
"He is gone on," replied the constable, "with the other gentlemen;
and a mighty passion he is in, too, at you, Mr. Arden. He vows that
you left him to be murdered, and that he would have been murdered
too, if it had not been for that Captain Churchill that is with him."
"Captain Churchill!" cried the Messenger--"Captain Churchill! Why,
Captain Churchill was sick in bed yesterday morning, to my certain
knowledge!"
After a moment's thought, however, he concluded that the person who
chose to assume that name might be Lord Sherbrooke, and he asked,
"What sort of a man was he? Was he a slight young gentleman, about my
height?"
"Oh bless you, no," replied the constable. "There wasn't one of them
that was not three or four inches taller than you."
"Captain Churchill!" said the Messenger--"Captain Churchill!" and he
added, in a lower voice, "I'll bet my life this is some d---d
Jacobite, who has imposed himself upon this foolish boy for Captain
Churchill. I'll be after them, and see."
Thus saying, he set off at full speed after Wilton and his party, and
reached them within a minute after that gentleman had dropped behind.
"Is that you, Mr. Arden?" demanded Wilton, as he came up. "Stop a
moment, I wish to speak to you."
"And I wish to go on, and see who you've got there, sir," said Arden,
in a somewhat saucy tone, at the same time endeavouring to pass
Wilton.
"Stop, sir!" cried the young gentleman, catching him by the collar.
"Do you mean to say, that you will now disobey my orders, after
having left me to provide for my own security, with the dastardly
cowardice that you have displayed? Did not the Earl direct you to
obey me in everything?"
"I will answer it all to the Earl," replied the man, in an insolent
tone. "If he chooses to put me under a boy, I do not choose to be
collared by one. Let me go, Mr. Brown, I say."
"I order you, sir," said Brown, without loosing his hold, "to go
instantly back, and aid the people in searching the grounds of that
house!--now, let me see if you will disobey!"
"I will search here first, though," said the man. "By, I believe
that's Sir George Barkley, on before there. He's known to be in
England. Let me go, Mr. Brown, I say, or worse will come of it!" and
he put his hand to his belt, as if seeking for a pistol.
Without another word, Wilton instantly knocked him down with one blow
of his clenched fist, and at the same moment he called out aloud,
"Captain Byerly! and you constable, who are showing the way--come