"Oliver, mother dear, hasn't seen Major Tixall, whose face is enough to make an owl talk, let alone a magpie like me." Her right ear was near enough to me, the stool being big and I bigger, so I pinched the pretty little pink shell, and whispered in it, "Shut up, Kit, and think of Jack," which effectually silenced her. Mistress Waynflete had little more to tell. They had travelled rapidly, avoiding Coventry and Lichfield, where the royal forces had assembled, but bending west so as to get by unfrequented roads to Stafford, and so on to the main north road along which the Prince was now reported to be marching. Just outride the "Bull and Mouth" her horse had cast a shoe. Leaving her to rest in the ale-house, the Colonel had gone on with the horses to the nearest smithy at Milford. He was quite unaware of the northward movement of troops from Lichfield, and was under the impression that he was now well beyond the danger zone. We had heard from the serjeant of his capture. Kate, at mother's request, took up the tale here. The road past the Hanyards to the village enters the main road abruptly, and clumps of elms prevent anyone travelling along it from seeing what is happening in the village. The vicarage is opposite the smithy and the inn, and when mother and Kate got there, only a few dragoons were about. They watched the Colonel ride up, leading his daughter's horse, and saw him turn round at once and attempt to go back as soon as he caught sight of the dragoons; but a larger body, under the command of Major Tixall, cantered in at the moment and, trapped between the two bodies, the Colonel had been compelled to surrender. He was kept until my Lord Brocton's arrival nearly an hour later, and had then been sent on to Stafford under a strong guard. This was the only fresh piece of information that was of any importance. There is a jail at Stafford, and no doubt the Colonel was by now lodged in it. "I fear that my views, or at any rate my father's views, make me a dangerous guest," said Mistress Waynflete, "though your kindness has made me a welcome one." "Madam," I said coldly, "the only politics I know is that my Lord Brocton is fighting against the Stuart, and if by fighting for the Stuart I can get in a fair blow at my Lord Brocton, I fight for the Stuart." "Oliver," said mother, "it is wrong--I say nothing about its wisdom--to choose sides in such matters on grounds of personal enmity." "Lord Brocton's a beast," said Kate shortly. Mistress Waynflete had turned a richer colour at the mention of Brocton's name, but at Kate's words she became scarlet, and for that I vowed I would knock him on the head as ruthlessly as if he were a buck rabbit as soon as I got the chance.