He dropped in his chair again as if exhausted by the vehemence of his words and the emotion which prompted them. Thoroughgood contemplated him sourly. "You prate like a play-actor," he snarled. Halfman's whole being flashed into activity again. He was no more a sentimentalist but now a roaring ranter. "Because I was a play-actor once," he shouted, "when I was a sweet-and-twenty youngling." Thoroughgood eyed Halfman with a sudden air of distrust. "You never told me you were a play-actor," he growled. "You spoke only of soldiering." Halfman laughed flagrantly in his face. "Godamercy, man, there has been scant time to tell you my life's story. We have had other cats to whip. Yes, I was a play-actor once, and played for great poets, for men whose names have never tickled your ears. But the owl-public would have none of me, and, owllike, hooted me off the boards. But I've had my revenge of them. I've played a devil's part on the devil's stage for thirty red years. Nune Plaudite." The Latin tag dropped dead at the porches of John Thoroughgood's ears, but those ears pricked at part of Halfman's declamation. "What kind of parts?" he asked, drawing a little nearer to the soldier of fortune, whose experiences fascinated his inexperience. Halfman shrugged his shoulders and favored honest Thoroughgood with a bantering, quizzical smile. "All kinds of parts," he answered. "How does the old puzzle run? Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor, ploughboy, gentleman, thief. I think I have played all those parts, and others, too. Fling beggar and pirate into the dish. But I tell you this, honest John, I have never played a part so dear to me as that of captain to this divine commander. I thank my extravagant stars that steered me home to serve her." "You cannot sing her praises too sweetly for my ears," Thoroughgood answered. "But there is an end to all things, and it looks to me as if we were mighty near to an end of the siege of Harby. Why else should there be a truce called that the Roundhead captain may have speech with my lady." "Honest John Thoroughgood," Halfman answered, with great composure, "you are not so wise as you think. This Roundhead captain has sent us hither the most passionate pleadings to be admitted to parley. Why deny him? It will advantage him no jot, but it is possible we may learn from the leakage of his lips something at least of what is going on in the world." "What is there to learn?" asked Thoroughgood. Halfman shook his head reprovingly. "Why, for my part, I should like to learn why in all this great gap of time nothing has been done to help one side or the other. If the gentry of Harby have made no effort to relieve us, neither, on the other hand, has our leaguer been augmented by any reinforcements. If my lady has been surprised that Sir Blaise Mickleton has made no show of coming to her succor, I, for my part, am woundily surprised that the Cropheads of Cambridge have sent no further levies for our undoing."