Percy was becoming interested. At a short distance they came to a sort of clearing, where there had once been, so tradition said, a log hut; and here they stopped. The boy cast a quick, sweeping glance around, and then spoke. “Mr. Maitland, Uncle Rodney bade me tell you there is danger, and you must look sharp. Cap’n Tryon has been to your mother’s--” “Captain Tryon! Is he here?” “Yes, sir. He came some time in the night, and he’s in a terrible way.” “But what has he come for? What has happened to upset him?” “Why, sir--as Uncle Donald told it to me--somewhere on the road, between this and Burton, somebody saw him that knew him. He was on the outside of the stage-coach with the driver, and it was the driver that told him how the man had looked at him. “Well, sir, the next time the coach stopped with the mail, up comes three officers and tells the cap’n he’s their prisoner. P’rhaps you can guess how he took it. They must have had a pretty sharp time of it for a little while. “Cap’n Tryon’s got two bullets in him--one in his arm and the other in his shoulder, but he give ’em the slip. He says he left two of ’em on the ground, but he didn’t know whether they were dead or not. Mercy! how he did swear! I heard him while he was on board the brig.” “But what has this to do with me, Guy?” “Ah, that’s just it, sir! He--that’s the cap’n--swears ’at you’ve been and blowed on him; and on the rest of us. Of course, Uncle Donald knew better, and so did I; but what’s the use of our saying anything against him? He swears ’at you’ve blowed, and now he’s goin’ to have vengeance.” The boy paused at this point, and looked up into Percy’s face, as though waiting for a reply. Evidently, he expected a disclaimer. At all events, the young man knew that it would greatly please him to receive one, and he gave it at once, and emphatically. “Guy--Ralph Tryon lies if he says so! and I believe he knows he lies! Now, tell me, what does he propose to do?” “That’s what we don’t know, sir; but Uncle Donald says you must keep an eye on your mother. It’s a hard thing to say--dreadful hard to tell a man to beware of his own mother--but so it is. It’s to her the cap’n has been; and uncle overheard enough between ’em to be very sure ’at mischief is meant to yourself, sir!” “How did your uncle happen to overhear this? Where did it happen?” “At the cottage, sir, to-day. The cap’n came aboard the brig about midnight--the last that ever was. The lookout heard him call for a boat, and uncle went off and got him. This forenoon he went ashore, and Uncle Donald with him; and they went up to the cottage; and while the cap’n was tellin’ his story to Mistress Margery, Donald went out; and they must have thought he’d gone further away. I s’pose, if the truth was told, he was list’nin’. I wish you could see the old man; but he can’t leave the brig; and he says it wouldn’t do for you to come there.” “Can you tell me anything that was said?” Percy asked eagerly.