events we all
four are lately come from Tangier."

"Oh, from Tangier," cried Mitchelbourne. The riddle was becoming
clear. That extraordinary siege when a handful of English red-coats
unpaid and ill-fed fought a breached and broken town against countless
hordes for the honour of their King during twenty years, had not yet
become the property of the historian. It was still an actual war
in 1681. Mitchelbourne understood whence came the sunburn on his
antagonists' faces, whence the stains and the worn seams of their
clothes. He advanced to the table and spoke with a greater respect
than he had used.

"Did one of you," he asked, "leave a Moorish pipe behind you at an inn
of Saxmundham?"

"Ah," said the Major with a reproachful glance at Captain Bassett. The
Captain answered with some discomfort:

"Yes. I made that mistake. But what does it matter? You are here none
the less."

"You have with you some of the Moorish tobacco?" continued
Mitchelbourne.

Captain Bassett fetched out of his pocket a little canvas bag, and
handed it to Mitchelbourne, who untied the string about the neck, and
poured some of the contents into the palm of his hand. The tobacco was
a fine, greenish seed.

"I thought as much," said Mitchelbourne, "you expected Mr. Lance
to-night. It is Mr. Lance whom you thought to misdirect to this
solitary house. Indeed Mr. Lance spoke of such a place in this
neighbourhood, and had a mind to buy it."

Captain Bassett suddenly raised his hand to his mouth, not so quickly,
however, but Mitchelbourne saw the grim, amused smile upon his lips.
"It is Mr. Lance for whom you now mistake me," he said abruptly.

The young man at the door uttered a short, contemptuous laugh, Major
Chantrell only smiled.

"I am aware," said he, "that we meet for the first time to-night, but
you presume upon that fact too far. What have you to say to this?" And
dragging a big and battered pistol from his pocket, he tossed it upon
the table, and folded his arms in the best transpontine manner.

"And to this?" said Captain Bassett. He laid a worn leather powder
flask beside the pistol, and tapped upon the table triumphantly.

Mr. Mitchelbourne recognised clearly that villainy was somehow
checkmated by these proceedings and virtue restored, but how he could
not for the life of him determine. He took up the pistol.

"It appears to have seen some honourable service," said he. This
casual remark had a most startling effect upon his