I say, then, that we were lying in Exeter Jail, expecting to be called out for execution at any hour. We were sitting in the courtyard on the stone bench with gloomy hearts. 'Robin--Humphrey--lads both!' cried a voice we knew. It was the Rector, Mr. Boscorel himself, who called us. 'Courage, lads!' he cried (yet looked himself as mournful as man can look). 'I bring you good news--I have this day ridden from Ilminster (there is other news not so good)--good news, I say: for you shall live, and not die! I have so far succeeded that the lives are spared of Robin Challis, Captain in the Rebel Cavalry; Barnaby Eykin, Captain of the Green Regiment; and Humphrey Challis, Chyrurgeon to the Duke. Yet must you go to the Plantations--poor lads!--there to stay for ten long years. Well, we will hope to get your pardon and freedom long before that time is over. Yet you must, perforce, sail across the seas.' 'Lad,' cried Robin, catching my hand, 'cease to tear thy heart with reproaches! See! none of us will die, after all.' 'On the scaffold, none,' said Mr. Boscorel. 'On the scaffold, none,' he repeated. 'And what saith my grandfather, Sir?' Robin asked. 'He is also enlarged, I hope, at least. And how is the learned Dr. Eykin? and Alice--my Alice--where is she?' 'Young men,' said the Rector, 'prepare for tidings of the worst--yes; of the very worst. Cruel news I bring to you, boys; and for myself'--he hung his head--'cruel news, shameful news?' Alas! you know already what he had to tell us. Worse than the death of that good old man, Sir Christopher; worse than the death of the unfortunate Dr. Eykin and his much-tried wife; there was the news of Alice's marriage and of her flight, and at hearing this we looked at each other in dismay, and Robin sprang to his feet and cried aloud for vengeance upon the villain who had done this thing. 'It is my own son,' said Mr. Boscorel; 'yet spare him not! He deserves all that you can call him, and more. Shameful news I had to tell you. Where the poor child hath found a retreat or how she fares, I know not. Robin, ask me not to curse my own son--what is done will bring its punishment in due time. Doubt it not. But of punishment we need not speak. If there were any way--any way possible--out of it! But there is none. It is a fatal blow. Death itself alone can release her. Consider, Humphrey, consider; you are not so distracted as your cousin. Consider, I say, that unhappy girl is Benjamin's lawful wife. If he can find her, he may compel her to live with him. She is his lawful wife, I say. It is a case in which there is no remedy; it is a wickedness for which there is no help, until one of the twain shall die.'