“Sevier, beware! Beware how you characterize any compact I sign with Spain. You mouth the word ‘secret’ as if it were something shameful. I tell you to heed your words, for you are in my power—and I am trying to forget that fact.” “To be in a gentleman’s power is to be his guest,” was the calm retort. With a Gallic flinging out of hands and shrugging of shoulders the emperor dropped into his chair, crying: “You have disarmed me. Suppose we take up your reasons for coming here—a most unusual proceeding you must admit—in view of the ‘secret’ treaty.” Sevier’s gaze strayed to the window as if to peer forth and penetrate the darkness. “I have two objects,” he slowly began. “The most important is to find Major John Tonpit. I admit I had hoped to overtake him before he arrived here.” “Tonpit? What the devil! It appears that all my guests come with but one thought—to see Major Tonpit.” And McGillivray did not attempt to conceal his exasperation. “That young man from your settlements, whom I was forced to lock up, would hear of nothing but the Tonpits. The Emperor of the Creeks was merely an agency through which he would find the Tonpits. In truth, he seemed eager to tear the secret from me by blood and violence. He seemed to believe I was hiding something from him. My Creeks wanted to kill him on the spot, but there is much white blood in me and I forgave him because of Miss Elsie Tonpit, who no doubt has turned his head. So I saved him from my reckless fellows by locking him up.” “He’s in love with the girl. Why torture him? You are said to be kind to prisoners. Why not let him see her?” McGillivray groaned and rested his head against the back of the chair, eying Sevier half humorously, half angrily. “Why not let him see her?” he mocked. “I would give a thousand pounds to see her myself.” Sevier bounced from his chair and dropped back again. “She has not come? Her father has not come?” “Curse it! Are you trying to bait me?” Sevier slumped low in the chair and glared blankly at the emperor. “Not here,” he mumbled. “Then, where are they?” McGillivray began pacing the room, a crafty cunning glittering through his half-closed lids as he watched the borderer. Finally coming to a halt before Sevier, he stared down at him and slowly inquired— “Are you sure, John Sevier of the Nolichucky, that you don’t know where they are?” “If I did, would I be here?” asked Sevier bitterly. The emperor weighed his show of sincerity and at last accepted it at face value. His lofty brow became worried. “Polcher said they started for here. He is much disturbed that they haven’t arrived. You and Polcher could scarcely be called friends?” “He’s the minor reason for my coming to Little Talassee. I’ve promised myself the pleasure of hanging him.” McGillivray’s lips tightened in displeasure at this bold assertion, and his Indian blood came to the fore and he hissed— “Be careful how you talk of hanging a friend of the Creeks in the country of the Creeks.”