“Is that all?” said the young man, scornfully.  “I judge from thy speech that these lies come in letters from England.  Pray, are they credited by any one, save by them of the baser sort?”

“Callest thou me one of the baser sort?  Wilt thou revile them who are set in authority over thee?  Have a care, my young cockeril, or thy own comb may chance to be cut.”

“Out with thee, malapert knave,” said the young man, in his vexation, “and know to respect thy betters.  Truly, the world is come to a pretty pass, when a fowl like thee is permitted to ruffle his feathers at a gentleman.”

“An’ he were not in some sort an ambassador, whom I have heard it is unlawful for a constable to touch,” growled Master Prout to himself, as Arundel angrily turned his back upon him, “I had taught him incontinently, better than to speak to me in this fashion.  As it is, I will advise with Master Spikeman about this matter.”  So saying, with a flushed brow, the irate officer of the law departed.

“What means this, Colonel McMahon?” demanded Arundel.  “Here have I been a bare three weeks away, on business of the commonwealth, and on my return I find myself rewarded with sour looks and unpleasant speeches, sans any consciousness of deserving them.  I cannot ask a plain question, without being answered in riddles that would have crazed the brain of OEdipus.”

The person addressed, a grave man, of middle age, and the same who had had the words with Endicott about the cutting out of the cross, took the questioner aside, and, as soon as they were out of hearing, answered: 

“Truly am I afraid that I shall also be involved in thy condemnation of those who return answers after the manner of the sphynx; but, to be short, there have two ships lately arrived from England, bringing, it is said, unpleasant tidings touching Sir Christopher Gardiner.”

“What be these tidings?” inquired Arundel, noticing that the speaker hesitated.

“I neither am, nor desire to be, in the confidence of the government,” answered Colonel McMahon, haughtily, the wounds inflicted on whose loyalty by the mutilation of the standard, were not yet healed; “and the information I have is derived from a private source and uncertain rumor.  For the former, the Knight is pointed at as an agent of Sir Ferdinando Gorges; for the latter, it becomes me not to heed the idle chatter of the vulgar.”

“Comports it with your sense of propriety to reveal more?” asked Arundel.

“Were I never so desirous,” said the Colonel, courteously, “I should be unable.  In fact, what I have told is the sum of my knowledge.  I could, indeed, indulge in surmises based on rumor, but that were too much like the gossiping of old women, and both unbecoming in me to speak and in you to hear, more especially as that rumor attaints in other respects the fair fame of your friend.  It is different with the base-born scullions around us, who are licensed to utter whatever their unruly imaginations may conceive; but a gentleman will not allow epithets upon his tongue to the disparagement of another, which, after all, may be false.”