Early next morning Donald Ward and Neal set forth on their journey. Rab MacClure’s horses served them well. By breakfast time they reached Ballymoney. They sat in the inn kitchen while the woman of the house broiled salmon for them. She was full of excitement, and very ready to talk. The yeomen had ridden through the town the day before. They had stopped at her house to drink. The officer and some of the men had paid their score and ridden on. Ten of them remained behind, and demanded more drink. Tumblers were brought to them as they sat in their saddles. One of them had proposed a toast—“To hell with all Papists and Presbyterians.”

“And that was no civil talk to use to me, when all the town knows that my man is an elder in the kirk.”

But there was more to follow. The troopers had flung down the tumblers—“the bonny cut glasses that were fetched from Wexford”—and shattered them on the pavement of the courtyard. Then they rode off without paying a penny, and when the mistress cried after them one man came back with his sword drawn in his hand, and she was fain to flee and hide herself. But the story of her own wrongs did not quench the good dame’s curiosity. She recognised Neal as the son of the minister in Dunseveric. It was towards Dunseveric that the yeomen had ridden. What did they do there? Had there been hanging work or burning—the like of what went on in other parts? Had they visited the minister’s house? Did Neal see them?

Donald Ward was a talkative man, and somewhat given to boasting; but, apart from the fact that the business of the night before gave him little excuse for glorying, he had plenty of sound sense—too much sense to gossip with the mistresses of inns about serious business. He signed to Neal to keep silent, and himself parried the shower of questions so adroitly that his hostess got no information from him. She tired at last, and with a show of disappointed temper, put the salmon on the table.

“There’s your fish for you,” she said, “and fadge and oaten farles, and if you want more you’d better show some civility to the woman that does for you.”

She left the room, and stood, her hands on her hips, staring into the street.

“We’re well rid of her tongue,” said Donald.

Before the travellers’ appetites were half satisfied she was with them again. She ran into the kitchen with every sign of terror in her face.

“They’re coming,” she said. “I seen them coming round MacCance’s corner, and they have men with them and led horses. I seen them plain, and one of them is Rab MacClure, of Ballintoy. Away with you, Neal Ward, away with you. I’m thinking that them that has Rab MacClure and his feet tied under the horse’s belly will be no friends of your father’s or yours.”

Donald Ward rose to his feet and stretched himself.

“The woman’s right, Neal.” He showed no signs of hurry in his speech. “I’m thinking it will be safer for us to be out of this. Here, mistress, what’s the reckoning?”

“Not a penny, not a penny, will I take. Are them murdering devils to drink without paying and me taking money from the son of Micah Ward or any friend of his? But for God’s sake get you gone. I’ll keep them dandering about the door for a while, and do you get your horses and out by the back way into the field. You can strike the road again lower down.”

It was late in the evening when Donald and Neal, with weary horses and wearier limbs, came close to Antrim. Neal was unused to riding long distances, and Donald complained that a voyage across the Atlantic left a man unfit for land travelling. They accosted a stranger on the road and asked his guidance to the best inn. The man answered them in a civil way. He spoke with a northern accent, but his voice was singularly sweet and gentle, and his words were those of a cultured man.

“I am on my way to the Massereene Arms,” he said. “I think you will find the accommodation good both for yourselves and your horses.”

He walked with them, chatting about the weather and the condition of the roads. He said that he himself had that day walked from Ballymena, and intended to spend the night in Antrim. He asked no questions and seemed in no way concerned with the affairs of his chance acquaintances.

Donald and Neal took their horses to the inn yard and saw them rubbed down, stabled, and fed. Then they entered the public room of the inn, sat down, and ordered their supper. The man who had guided them to the door sat at a corner of the table eating a frugal meal of bread and cheese. Beside his tumbler stood a large jug of buttermilk. In a few minutes he rose from the table and took his seat on a bench near the fire, where the light from a lamp, which hung on the wall, fell on him. He drew a notebook from his pocket, and proceeded to write in it, referring from time to time to scraps of paper, of which he seemed to have a large number. He was a man of middle height, of a spare frame, which showed no sign of great personal strength, but was well knit, and might easily have been capable of great endurance. His face was thin and narrow. He had very dark hair, and dark, gentle eyes. There was a suggestion about the mouth of the kind of strength which often goes with gentleness.

To Neal the appearance of the man was not very interesting. He watched him in mere idleness while waiting for the girl to bring the supper Donald had ordered. If there had been anyone else in the room Neal would not have wasted a second glance on the unobtrusive stranger. Yet, as he watched the man he became aware of something about him which was attractive. There was a dignity in his movements quite different from Donald Ward’s habitual self-assertion, different, too, from the stately confidence of Lord Dunseveric. There was a quiet seriousness in the way he set to work at his writing, and a methodical carefulness in his sorting of the scraps of paper which he drew one by one from his pocket. The maid entered with the wine and food which Donald had ordered.

“You’ll be for beds, the night,” she said.

“Ay,” said Donald, “and do you see that the feathers are well shaken and the beds soft. If you’d ridden all the miles I’ve ridden to-day, my girl, after not being on the back of a horse for three months, you’d want a soft bed to lie on.”

The stranger looked up from his notebook. There was laughter in his dark eyes, but it went no further than his eyes. His lips showed no inclination to smile.

Another man entered the room—a burly, strong man. He wore top boots, as if he had been riding. He looked like a well-to-do farmer. He gave no order to the girl, but walked straight to where the dark-eyed stranger sat. Greetings passed between them, and then talk in a low voice. Both of them looked at Donald and Neal. Then, beckoning to the girl, the stranger asked if he could be accommodated with a private room. The girl nodded, and went to prepare one. Donald Ward finished his supper, rose, stretched himself, yawned, and then drawing a stool near the fire, sat down and filled his pipe. Neal, interested to watch the evening street traffic in a strange town, climbed on to the deep sill of the window and pushed the lattice open. A blind piper sat on a stone bench outside the inn and played a reel for some boys and girls who danced on the road. A horseman—a handsomely-dressed man and well mounted—rode slowly up the street towards Lord Massereene’s demesne. One of the dancers crossed his way and caused the horse to shy. The rider cut at the girl with his whip. An angry growl followed the retreating figure. The piper stopped playing for a minute and listened. His face wore that eager look of strained attention which is seen often on the faces of the blind. He began to play again, and this time his tune was the “Ça Ira.” It was well-known to his audience and its significance was understood. Several voices began to hum it in unison with the pipes. More voices joined, and in a minute or two the little crowd was shouting the tune. A grave, elderly man, in the dark dress and white bands of a clergyman, stepped out of a house opposite the inn and approached the piper. The dancers and the onlookers stopped singing and saluted him respectfully. He spoke to the piper.

“Don’t be playing that tune, Phelim. Play your reel again. There’s trouble where those French tunes are played. It was so in Belfast a while ago. We want no riot in Antrim nor dragoons in our streets.”

“I’m thinking,” said the blind man, “that it’s the voice of Mr. Macartney, the Rector of Antrim, that I’m listening to. Well, reverend sir, I’ll stop my tune at your bidding. Not because you’re a magistrate, nor yet because you’re a great man, but just for the sake of the letter you wrote to save William Orr from being hanged.”

The pipes gave a long wail and were silent. Then another man came up the street. Neal could not see his face, for his hat was slouched over it, but the sound of his voice reached the open window.

“What’s this, boys? What’s this? Which of you is it bids the piper stop his tune? It’s only cowards and Orangemen that don’t like that tune.”

The voice struck Neal as one that he had heard before, but he could not recollect where he had heard it. He leaned out of the window to hear better.

The clergyman stepped out into the road and confronted the newcomer.

“It was I who bid the piper stop that tune. What have you to say to me?”

The other approached him swaggering, then hesitated, stood still, took off his hat, and held it in his hand.

“Oh, nothing to you, nothing at all, Mr. Macartney. I did not know you were here. Indeed, you were quite right to stop the man. As for what I said, I beg you to forget it. It was nothing but a joke, a little joke of mine.”

He bowed and cringed. He spoke in a deprecating whine, very different from the blustering tone he had used before. Neal’s interest in the scene before him became suddenly very acute. He was almost certain now that he recognised the voice. The whining tone brought back to him the night when he had interfered with James Finlay’s salmon poaching. The voice was, he felt sure of it, Finlay’s voice. He drew back quickly, and from within the window watched Finlay pass through the inn door. He heard his steps in the passage, heard him open the door of the room in which the travellers were gathered. Neal shrank back into the shadow of the window seat and watched.

Finlay swaggered across the floor and then paused and looked at Donald Ward, who smoked his pipe in the chimney corner. Then he turned to the other two.

“I don’t know this gentleman,” he said. “Is he——?”

He paused, his eyebrows elevated, his face expressing significant interrogation. Neal saw him plainly in the lamp light. He had not been mistaken in the voice. It was James Finlay. The man who had guided them to the inn rose without speaking and led the way to the private room which the maid had prepared for his reception. Neal jumped down from his seat and approached his uncle.

“Uncle Donald,” he said, “that was James Finlay, the man we are looking for.”

Donald took his pipe out of his mouth and looked hard at Neal.

“Are you quite sure?” he said. “It won’t do to be making a mistake in a job of this sort.”

“I’m quite sure.”

Donald replaced his pipe in his mouth and puffed hard at it for some minutes. Then he said—

“You don’t know either of the other two, I suppose? No. Well it can’t be helped. It would have been convenient if we had known. They may be honest men or they may be another pair of spies. I think I’ll try and find out something about them. Do you stay here, Neal, and watch. Let me know if any of the three of them leave the house. I’ll go down the passage to the tap-room. I’ll drink a glass or two, and I’ll see what information I can pick up. You see, my boy, if the other two are honest men we ought to warn them of our suspicions about Finlay. If they are spies we ought to know their names and warn somebody else. Any way, keep your eye on Finlay, and let me know if he stirs.”

A sensation of horror crept over Neal when his uncle left him. He realised that he was hunting a fellow-creature, that the hunt might end at any moment in the taking of human life. In Dunseveric Manse, while the anger which the yeomen’s blows and bonds had raised in him was awake, while the enormity of Finlay’s treachery was still fresh in his mind, it seemed natural and right that the spy should be killed. Now, when he had seen the man swagger down the street, when he had just watched him cringe and apologize, when he had sat within a few feet of him, it seemed a ghastly and horrible thing to track and pursue him for his life. A cold sweat bathed his limbs. His hands trembled. He sat on the stool near the fire shivering with cold and fear. He listened intently. It was growing late, and the piper had stopped playing in the street. The boys and girls who danced had gone home. There were voices of passers by, but these grew rarer. Now and then there was the trampling of a horse’s hoofs on the road as some belated traveller from Belfast pushed fast for home. A murmur of voices came to him from the interior of the inn, he supposed from the tap-room to which his uncle had gone, but he could hear nothing of what was said. Once the girl who had served his supper came in and told him that his bed was ready if he cared to go to it. Neal shook his head. Gradually he became drowsy. His eyes closed. He nodded. Then the very act of nodding awoke him with a start. He blamed himself for having gone near to sleeping at his post, for being neglectful of the very first duty imposed on him. The horror of the watch he was keeping returned on him. He felt that he was like a murderer lurking in the dark for some unsuspecting victim. For Finlay had no thought that he was distrusted, discovered, tracked. Then, to steel himself against pity, he let his mind go back over the events of the previous night. He thought of the scene in the MacClures’ cottage, of the heart-broken woman, of her husband riding with the brutal troopers to a trial without justice and a death without pity. He felt with his hand the blood caked on his own cheek, the scab on the cut where the yeoman had struck him. He remembered Una’s shriek and the Comtesse’s frantic struggles as the soldiers dragged them from their hiding-place. Of his own rush to their rescue he remembered little save the momentary delight of feeling his fists get home on the men’s faces.

He had nerved himself now with memories and conquered his qualms. He felt that it would be easy work and pleasant to drag James Finlay to earth and trample the life out of him. The thought of the insults of the brutal men who held Una and his own impotent struggles with the belt which bound him made him fierce enough. But the mood passed. His mind reverted to the subject which had never, all day, been far from his thoughts. He recalled each detail of his walk back to Dun-severic with Una, her words of praise for his bravery, the resting of her hand in his as they crossed stiles and ditches, the times when it rested in his hand longer than it need have rested, the great moment when he had ventured to clasp and keep it fast. He thrilled as he recollected holding her in his arms, the telling of his love, and Una’s wonderful reply to him. Emotion flooded him. Una loved him as he loved her. The future was impossible, unthinkable. At the best of times he could not hope that proud Lord Dunseveric would consent to let him marry Una; and now, of all times, now, when he was engaged in a dangerous conspiracy, pledged to a fight which he felt already to be hopeless; when he had the hangman’s ladder to look forward to, or, at best, the life of a hunted outlaw and exile to some foreign land; what could he expect now to come of his love for Una? His mind refused to dwell on such thoughts for long. It went back to the simple fact, the glorious, incredible thing which he had learned. Una loved him. That was sufficient for him then. He was happy.

The door of a room somewhere within the house closed noisily. There were footsteps on the stairs and then in the passage. Neal was alert. He quenched the light which hung on the wall and stood in the darkness looking out of the door. He saw three men pass him—James Finlay and the other two. They stood at the street door speaking last words in low voices. Neal sped down the passage to the tap-room. His uncle sat in a cloud of tobacco smoke, with a tumbler in his hand. Round him was gathered a knot of admirers, most of them somewhat tipsy. Donald was telling them stories of the American war. At the sight of Neal he rose quickly and laid down his tumbler. It was evident that he, at least, had drunk no more than he could stand.

“Well, has he moved?” he whispered.

“Yes,” said Neal. “He and the second man are going. They had their hats on and were bidding good night to the first, the man who brought us here.”

Donald left the tap-room quickly. The street door closed, and in the passage he found himself face to face with the gentle-mannered traveller whom he had accosted in the street.

“I think,” said Donald, “that I have the honour of addressing Mr. Hope.”

“James Hope,” said the other, “or Jemmy Hope. I am but a weaver, a simple man. I take no pride in the titles men give each other.”

“James Hope,” said Donald, “I’ve heard of you, and I’ve heard of you as an honest man. I reckon there’s no title higher than that one. I think, sir, that you have a room at your disposal in this house. May I speak with you there? I have matters of some importance.”

James Hope turned without a word and led the way upstairs to a small room. Three candles stood on the table. There were also tumblers and an empty whisky bottle. It was noticeable that there were only two tumblers. James Hope had not been drinking. Donald walked over to the table and blew out one of the candles.

“I’m not more superstitious than other men,” he said, “but I won’t sit in the room with three candles burning. It’s damned unlucky.”

Again, as earlier in the public room, Neal thought that James Hope was going to laugh. But again the laughter got no further than his eyes.

“Now,” said Donald, “if you’ve no objection, I’ll have a fresh bottle on the table and some clean glasses. You know this inn, James Hope, what’s their best drink?”

“I have but a poor head,” said Hope. “I drink nothing but water. But I believe that the whisky is good enough.”

“Neal, my boy,” said Donald, “the wench that bought us our supper is gone to bed, and the landlord’s too drunk to carry anything upstairs. You go and fill the jug there with hot water in the kitchen, and I’ll get some whisky from the taproom.”

Donald filled himself a glass with a generous proportion of spirit, and lit his pipe again.

“I’ve a letter here, addressed to you,” he said.

He fumbled in his breast pocket, drew forth a leather case, and took from it one of the letters which Micah Ward had written. James Hope read it carefully.

“You are,” he said, “the Donald Ward mentioned in this letter, and you are Neal Ward, the son of a man whom we all respect and admire. I bid you welcome.”

He held out his hand, first to Donald, who shook it heartily, and then to Neal. He fixed his dark eyes on the young man’s face, and looked long and steadily at him. Neal’s eyes wavered and dropped before this earnest scrutiny, which seemed to read his very thoughts.

“God bless you and keep you, my boy,” said James Hope. “You are the son of a brave man. I doubt not that you will be a brave man, too, brave in a good cause.”

Donald Ward seemed a little impatient at this long scrutiny of Neal and the speech which followed. He took several gulps of whisky and water and blew clouds of tobacco smoke. He cleared his throat noisily and said.

“You’ll be satisfied, James Hope, by the letter I’ve given you that we are men to be trusted?”

“God forbid else,” said Hope. “Whom should we trust if not the brother and son of Micah Ward?”

“Then I’ll come straight to the point,” said Donald. “Who were the two men that were with you just now?”

“The one of them,” said Hope, “was Aeneas Moylin, a Catholic, and a friend of Charlie Teeling. He’s a man that has done much to bring the Defender boys from County Down and Armagh into the society. He has a good farm of land near by Donegore.”

“And the other?”

“The other you ought to know, Neal Ward. He’s from Dunseveric. His name’s James Finlay.”

“I do know him,” said Neal, “but I don’t trust him.”

“He came to me,” said Hope, “with a letter from your father, like the letter you bring yourself. I have trusted him a great deal.”

“Trust him no more, then,” said Donald, “the man’s a spy. My brother was deceived in him.”

“These are grave words you speak,” said Hope. “Can you make them good?”

Donald told the story of the raid on the Dunseveric meeting-house. He dwelt on the fact that only five or six people knew of the buried cannon, that of these, only one, James Finlay, had left Dunseveric, that Neal Ward’s name had appeared on the list of suspected persons, though Neal had hitherto taken no part and had no knowledge of the doings of the United Irishmen; that his name must have been given to the authorities by some one who had a private spite against him; that James Finlay, and he alone of the people of Dunseveric, had any cause to seek revenge on Neal.

“It’s a case of suspicion,” said James Hope, “of heavy suspicion, but you’ve not proven that the man’s a traitor.”

“No,” said Donald, “it’s not proven. I know that well, but the man ought to be trusted no more until his character is cleared. He ought to be tried and given a chance of defending himself.”

James Hope sat silent. His fingers pushed back the lock of dark hair which hung over his forehead. His face grew stern, and there was a look of determination in his dark eyes. A frown gathered in deep wrinkles on his forehead. At last he spoke.

“You are on your way to Belfast. I shall give you a letter to Felix Matier, who keeps the inn with the sign of Dumouriez in North Street. You will find him easily. His house is a common meeting-place for members of the society. I shall tell him to have a careful watch kept on Finlay, and to communicate with you.”

“I’ll deal with the man,” said Donald, “as soon as I have anything more than suspicion to go on.”

“Deal uprightly, deal justly,” said Hope. “Ours is a sacred cause. It may be God’s will that we are to be victorious, or it may be written in His book that we shall fail. He alone knows the issue. But, either way, our hands must not be stained with crime. We must do justly, aye, and love mercy when mercy can be shown without imperilling the lives of innocent men.”

“Traitors must be dealt with as traitors are in all civilised States,” said Donald.

“Ay, truly, when we are sure that they are traitors.”

“I shall make sure,” said Donald, “and then——”

“Then———,” Hope sighed deeply. “Then—— you are right. There is no help for it. But remember, Donald Ward, that you and I must answer for our actions before the judgment seat of God. Remember, also, that our names and our deeds will be judged by posterity. We must not shrink from stern necessities laid upon us. But let us not give the enemy an excuse to brand us as assassins in the time to come.”

“God damn it, man, you speak to me as if you thought me a hired murderer. I take such language from no man living, and from you no more than another, James Hope. You shall answer for your words and your insinuations.”

Donald stood up as he spoke. His face was deeply flushed. He had drunk heavily during the evening. Even the best men, the leaders of every class and section of society drank heavily in those days. He was an exceptional man who always went to bed in full possession of his senses. Donald Ward was no worse than his fellows. But the man whom he challenged was one of the few for whom the wine bottle had no attractions. He was also one of those—rare in any age—who had learnt the mastery of self, whom no words, even insulting words, can drive beyond the limits of their patience.

“If I have spoken anything which hurts or vexes you, Donald Ward, I am sorry for it. I had no wish to do so. Comrades in a great enterprise must not quarrel with each other. I offer you my hand in token that I do not think of you as anything but an honourable man.”

“Spoken like a gentleman,” said Donald, grasping the outstretched hand. “Enough said, you have satisfied me that you meant no insult. A gentleman can do no more.”

“I am not what they call a gentleman,” said James Hope, “I am only a poor weaver with no claim to any such title.”