w?"

"No, sir."

"You understood all that was said. Eh, boy?" said Candlish.

"Yes, sir. I understood it all."

"Well, young man," said Falk. "You'll be sorry you did."

"Be quiet, Falk," said the Duke. "No one shall bully the boy. What's
your name, boy?"

"Martin Hyde, sir."

"A very smart lad too, sir," said Jermyn. "He saved my book of cipher
correspondence yesterday. We should have been in trouble if that had got
into the wrong hands."

"You understand," said the Duke, "that what you have heard might get us
all, perhaps many more besides ourselves, into very terrible danger if
repeated?"

"Yes, your Majesty, I understand," I answered. "Lock him into the
pantry, Jermyn," said the Duke, "while we decide what to do with him. Go
with Mr. Jermyn, boy. We sha'n't hurt you. Don't be frightened. Give him
some oranges, Jermyn."

CHAPTER V. I GO TO SEA

Mr. Jermyn led me to the pantry (a little room on the ground floor),
where he placed a plate of oranges before me.

"See how many you can eat," he said. "But don't try to burgle yourself
free. This is a strong room." He locked the heavy door, leaving me alone
with a well-filled pantry, which seemed to be without a window. A little
iron grating near the ceiling served as a ventilator. There was no
chance of getting out through that. The door was plated with iron. The
floor was of concrete. I was a prisoner now in good earnest. I was
no longer frightened; but I had had such scares that night that I had
little stomach for the fruit. I was only anxious to be allowed to go
back to my bed. I heard a dull noise in the upper part of the house,
followed by the falling of a plank. "There goes my bridge," I thought.
"Are they going to be so mean as to call my uncle out of bed, to show
him what I've been doing?" I thought that perhaps they would do this, as
my uncle (for all that I knew) might be in their plot. "Well," I said to
myself, "I shall get a good thrashing. Perhaps that brute Ephraim will
be told to thrash me. But thrashing or no, I've had enough of going out
at night. I'll ask my uncle not to thrash me, but to put me into the
Navy. I should love that. I know that I shall never get on in London."
This sudden plan of the Navy, about which I had never before thought,
seemed to me to be a good way of getting out of my deserts. I felt sure
that my uncle would be charmed to be rid of me; while I knew very well
that boys of that generation often entered the Navy, i