The proposal was certainly as strange a one as ever was made, and as unpleasant a one as could have been addressed, to Henry Beauchamp. I have said before that he was naturally fearless; and, consequently, did not see one half of the dangers in anything proposed that most other people would have done; but, at the same time, he had not the slightest inclination to run himself into scrapes of any kind, without necessity; and he could not help perceiving that the business was at once a perilous one, and one which might be much better performed without his interference. In the next place, he did not think the occupation particularly dignified or becoming; and thirdly, he did not at all like the eclat it would produce, and felt most exquisitely annoyed at the very idea of the romantic interest of the story, as it would figure in all the newspapers, and be told in all the coteries. It was quite enough, he thought, to have been made to drown himself for the amusement of the public; and certainly something too much, to be obliged to apprehend two murderers, _vi et armis_ without any cause or necessity whatever. "Well, sir! Will you do it?" demanded the young sailor, seeing that he paused upon his proposal. "Why, I think not," answered Beauchamp. "D--me, then!"--cried the other; but Beauchamp interrupted him in that commanding tone which no one knew better how to assume. "Hush, sir! Hush!" he said. "You forget yourself, and who you are speaking to. Call not down in words those curses, which I trust that your present and your future actions may avert, however much the past may have merited them. In regard to your proposal--in the first place, I am not a thief-taker; and consequently the task does not become me. In the next place, by the plan you suggest, the great object I have in view is likely to be defeated--I mean the bringing these men to justice, in order to clear Captain Delaware. Suppose, for instance, that by any accident we should be overpowered by them, we lose his only hope; and even if we overpower them, having no legal authority to do so, any one who happens to be near, may give them such aid and assistance as will enable them to escape, and foil us entirely." "I will tell you what, sir," said the young man sullenly, "I'll go some length, but I will not go all. To prevent them getting away anyhow, you may put the police round the house if you like--but only you and I shall go in upon them; for I will not take odds against them anyhow; and if you are afraid to go, why"----