Gervase drew him aside by the sleeve, hastily explaining how matters stood; but there was no comfort or hope in his answer. He had not seen the boy, but there might be good reason for that; the woman should have kept the lad at home if she was unwilling he should take his chance, and no one could be blamed if he went down with the rest. One more or less, what did it matter? The girl stood listening to their brief conversation with flashing eyes, and then took her mother by the arm, and drawing her into the inner room closed the door behind them. Macpherson was in the enemy´s country and accordingly made himself at home. Under his direction a meal was soon prepared, and a cask of home-brewed ale that had been discovered in a recess, was rolled into the middle of the floor, and the men helped themselves. They were too tired for much speech and devoted themselves to their repast in silence, addressing one another occasionally in undertones, and making huge inroads on the rashers and coarse bread that rapidly disappeared before them. Macpherson sat moodily apart, eating and drinking but sparingly--a marked contrast to De Laprade who seemed to forget that he was a prisoner, and laughed at his own conceits with light-hearted gaiety. He had divested himself of his peruke and riding boots, and stretched himself along the rude settle that stood near the hearth. He appeared to pay no attention to the stern leader who scowled more and more deeply as the Vicomte´s laugh grew louder, and the tone of his conversation assumed a more unbecoming levity. Gervase could not help feeling interested, for the type was altogether new to him--there was a life and colour about the stories to which he was a stranger; it was a little bit of Versailles, brilliant and careless, set down in the wilds of Fermanagh. “Pardieu!” said the Vicomte, “it was play that did it; there was nothing else left. My creditors will miss me, I do not doubt, but they were troublesome and I hate trouble; so I hastened to seek glory--bah! it is a greater trouble than the other. Where is the glory when your soldiers will not fight, and your king is a poltroon? There is no music like the rattle of the dicebox, when fortune, the beautiful goddess, is smiling like a lover. Love and play are the two things that make life worth living.” “Of love,” said Gervase, “I know nothing, but for play--I leave that to the fool and the knave. Nay, I mean not to say that men of honour have not ere now given themselves up to its strange fascination, but it was their weakness. For me, I like rather to hear the yelp of the otter hounds when the morning is young and the spring woods are full of life and beauty, or the cry of the beagles when the scent is lying strong. You have never seen the brown trout in the freshet?” “There were no fish in the ponds at Versailles,” said the Vicomte drily, “but when a great lady dropped her fan--”