secretly; and the host said,--

"The gentleman is one Mr. Raper, sir, head clerk to Mr. Fagan, of Mary's
Abbey."

"Leave the room--close the door," said Curtis, with an air of caution.
"I saw the signal you gave the innkeeper a moment ago, MacNaghten," said
he, in the same low and guarded tone. "I read its meaning perfectly.
You would imply: The old fellow is not right--a crack in the upper
story--humor him a bit. Don't deny it, man; you acted for the best; you
thought, as many think, that my misfortunes had affected my intellect
and sapped my understanding; and so they had done this many a day,"
added he, fiercely, "but for one thing. I had one grand security against
madness, Dan; one great barrier, my boy: shall I tell it you? It
was this, then: that if my head wandered sometimes, my heart never
did--never! I hated the English and their party in this country with a
hate that never slept, never relaxed! I knew well that I was the only
man in Ireland that they could not put down. Some they bought--some
they ruined--some they intimidated--some they destroyed by calumny. They
tried all these with me, and at last were driven to a false accusation,
and had me up for a murder! and that failed them, too! Here I stand,
their opponent, just as I did fifty-two years ago, and the only man in
all Ireland that dares to brave and defy them. They 'd make me a peer
to-morrow, Dan; they 'd give me a colonial government; they 'd take me
into the Cabinet; there is not a demand of mine they 'd say 'No' to, if
I 'd join them; but my answer is, 'Never! never!' Go down to your grave,
Joe Curtis, ruined, ragged, half-famished, mayhap. Let men call you a
fool, and worse! but the time will come, and the people will say: There
was once a man in Ireland that never truckled to the Castle, nor fawned
on the Viceroy; and that when he stood in the dock, with his life on the
venture, told them that he despised their vengeance, though he knew that
they were covering it with all the solemnity of a law-court; and that
man his contemporaries--ay, even his friends--were pleased to call Mad!"

"Come, come, Curtis, you know well this is not my impression of you; you
only say so jestingly."

"It's a sorry theme to crack jokes upon," said the other, sadly. He
paused, and seemed to reflect deeply for some minutes, and then, in a
voice of peculiar meaning, and with a look of intense cunning in his
small gray eyes, said, "We heard the name he mentioned,--Raper