tolerable distinctness; during which interval the figure
remained perched alone, against the summer evening sky, looking down
into the troubled street.

"Are you," said Hugh at length, "Mr. Akerman, the head jailer here?"

"Of course he is, brother," whispered Dennis. But Hugh, without minding
him, took his answer from the man himself.

"Yes," he said; "I am."

"You have got some friends of ours in your custody, master."

"I have a good many people in my custody." He glanced downward as he
spoke, into the jail; and the feeling that he could see into the
different yards, and that he overlooked everything which was hidden from
their view by the rugged walls, so lashed and goaded the mob that they
howled like wolves.

"Deliver up our friends," said Hugh, "and you may keep the rest."

"It's my duty to keep them all. I shall do my duty."

"If you don't throw the doors open, we shall break 'em down," said Hugh;
"for we will have the rioters out."

"All I can do, good people," Akerman replied, "is to exhort you to
disperse; and to remind you that the consequences of any disturbance in
this place will be very severe, and bitterly repented by most of you,
when it is too late."

He made as though he would retire when he had said these words, but he
was checked by the voice of the locksmith.

"Mr. Akerman!" cried Gabriel, "Mr. Akerman!"

"I will hear no more from any of you," replied the governor, turning
towards the speaker, and waving his hand.

"But I am not one of them," said Gabriel. "I am an honest man, Mr.
Akerman; a respectable tradesman--Gabriel Varden, the locksmith. You
know me?"

"You among the crowd!" cried the governor in an altered voice.

"Brought here by force--brought here to pick the lock of the great door
for them," rejoined the locksmith. "Bear witness for me, Mr. Akerman,
that I refuse to do it; and that I will not do it, come what may of my
refusal. If any violence is done to me, please to remember this."

"Is there no way of helping you?" said the governor.

"None, Mr. Akerman. You'll do your duty, and I'll do mine. Once again,
you robbers and cut-throats," said the locksmith, turning round upon
them, "I refuse. Ah! Howl till you're hoarse. I refuse."

"Stay--stay!" said the jailer, hastily. "Mr. Varden, I know you for a
worthy man, and one who would do no unlawful act except upon
compulsion--"

"Upon compulsion, sir," interposed the locksmith, who felt that the tone
in which this wa