, colonel," he said: "do not tempt me too far. If
my sins have been many, my wrongs are more. It must be this or worse.
One word from me, and you are a dead man."

He laid four pistols on the smith's tool-chest. "Take a pair of them,"
he said. "They are loaded alike. Take which you please. Let us stand
on the opposite sides of this hovel, and so make an end. If I fall, I
swear on my soul you shall have no hurt from any of my people. My
friend Connell is an officer of mine, but he holds a commission
besides in the Irish Brigade. There is no better-born gentleman in
Kerry. His presence here is your sufficient security. You shall return
to Dunboy as safe from harm as if you had the Viceroy's body-guard
about you, or your own boat's crew that shot down my poor fellows at
Glengariff. To this I pledge you my honor."

"Your honor!" said Goring; "your honor! And you tempted me here by a
lying tale, sent by the lips of yonder skulking rascal. That alone,
sir, were there nothing else, would have sufficed to show what you
are."

A significant click caught the ear of both the speakers. Looking
round, they saw Sylvester had cocked a pistol.

"Drop that," said Morty, "or by God! kinsman of mine though you be, I
will drive a bullet through the brain of you. Enough of this, sir," he
said, turning to Goring. "Time passes, and this scene must end. I
would have arranged it otherwise, but you yourself know that by this
way alone I could have brought you to the meeting. Take the pistols, I
say, or by the bones of my ancestors that lie buried under Dunboy
Castle yonder, I will call in my men from outside, and they shall
strip you bare, and score such marks on you as the quartermaster
leaves on the slaves that you hire to fight your battles. Prince
Charles will laugh when I tell him in Paris how I served one at least
of the hounds that chased him at Culloden."

The forge in which this scene was going on was perfectly familiar to
Goring, for he had himself designed it and built it. There was the
ordinary broad open front to the road, constructed of timber, which
was completely shut. The rest of the building was of stone, and in the
wall at the back there was a small door leading into a field, and
thence into the country. Could this door be opened, there was a
chance, though but a faint one, of escape. A bar lay across, but of no
great thickness. The staple into which it ran was slight. A vigorous
blow might shatter both.

Sylvester cau