"Only by your manner. But look here," continued Roy, "I want very badly to see that place where the enemy got in." "Ay, and so do I, sir. I've lain awake at nights with that place worrying me more than my big chop as ought to ha' been well by this time. I don't understand it yet, only I expect as he let 'em in. So he filled all the long underground passages with the men, and got 'em there ready to go up the towers when the signal was given? I daresay he give it with his miserable squeak of a pipe." "I'm going to ask General Hepburn to let me see the place." "And he won't let you, of course. You'll have to give the sentries something, and perhaps they may." "No; I'm not going to do anything underhanded, Ben. I shall ask the general himself." "Oh come, I like that, sir," said Ben, derisively. "He didn't do anything underhanded along with Fiddler Pawson, did he?" "Wound shooting, Ben?" said Roy, drily. The old soldier chuckled, and the boy rose and went straight to the general's snug quarters in a little place adjoining the dining-room to prefer his request. CHAPTER THIRTY TWO. THE WAY IN AND THE WAY OUT. The sentries challenged Roy as he went along the corridors, and it made his heart ache for this to take place in his own old home; but as he was passed on directly, he drew himself up, went to the door, knocked, and the general's deep hard voice cried, "Come in." General Hepburn was seated at a table writing, but he threw down his pen as he saw who it was, and smiled. "What can I do for you, my restless prisoner?" he said. "I want you to give me a pass for the sentries, so that I can go and examine the passage through which you brought your men that night, sir." "Why? What for?" "Out of curiosity. Isn't it natural, sir, that after being here all my life, and then tricked like that, I should want to know how it was done?" "Yes," said the general, abruptly; and he took up his pen and wrote something upon a piece of paper, swept some pounce over it, shook it, and gave it to his petitioner. "You can go and see it." "And take Sergeant Martlet with me, sir? He was my lieutenant and adviser." The general snatched the paper back, wrote in a line, and once more handed it. "Yes," he said; "but I must be strict, boy. You will have a sergeant's guard with you all the time." "Of course," said Roy; "but I am not going to try and escape to-day." "No," said the general, smiling, and taking up his pen again; "you are not going to try and escape to-day." As Roy went away, the guard was being changed, and the place rang with the tramp of men, the officer on duty visiting the different posts and examining everything in the keenest way. "Ah, they're doing it right enough, Master Roy," said Ben; and the lad started, for he had not heard the old sergeant's approach. "Taking a lesson?" "I was watching them, Ben."