master's a bad man, and him and you will be hung or chopped as
sure as you're alive."

"You always was a muddlehead, Natty. It's your master as is the bad
man; Colonel Forrester's a thorough gentleman, and we always had better
fruit and garden stuff at the Manor than you had at the Hall, and that's
what makes you so wild against me."

"Yah! Why, you never grew anything but weeds at the Manor. Your garden
was just as if pigs had got into it."

"Did you think so, Natty?" said Samson, good-temperedly.

"Yes."

"That shows what I say 's right. You always was such a muddlehead that
you couldn't tell good from bad, and you don't know any better now.
Poor old Nat, I don't bear you any malice or hatred in my heart. I'm
sorry for you."

Nat ground his teeth gently, for his brother's easy-going way angered
him.

"Sorry for me?" he said. "Why, you're a miserable rebel, that's what
you are."

"Not I, Natty; not a bit miserable. If you was not here, I should lie
back and sing."

"Shall you sing when they take you out and hang you?"

"Not going to hang me, Natty; not ugly enough. Now, if it had been
you--I say, Nat, I should like to have you hung up in the Manor garden
to keep away the birds."

"What?"

"To scare 'em. You do look such an old Guy Fawkes. I say, who cut your
hair?"

Nat's hand went involuntarily to his freshly shorn head, and a dull red
glow came into his cheeks.

"You wait till I get better, and I'll crop it for you neatly. Why, you
don't look one thing nor the other now. Cavaliers wouldn't own you, and
I should be ashamed to set aside you in our ranks."

"Go on," said Nat, grinning viciously. "That's your nastiness; but it
don't tease me. I'm sorry for you, Samson. What a pass for a
respectable Dee to come to, only you never was respectable. But there's
an end to all things. Made your will?"

"Nay, Natty, not yet."

"Thought you might like to leave any clothes you've got to your
brother."

"Well, I did think about it, Natty; but, you see, my brother's grown to
be such a high and mighty sort of chap as wouldn't care for anything
that wasn't scarlet and gold. I say, Natty, I have got something though
as you may as well have--hidden away in the roof of my tool-shed."

"Eh? What is it?" said Nat, who was betrayed into eagerness by the idea
that perhaps his brother had a pot of money hidden away in the thatch.

"Perhaps I'd better not let you have it. You're proud enough as