“You gave us a nice scare yesterday, Conway,” was Captain O’Connor’s greeting as they marched in.  “When twelve o’clock came and you didn’t come back I began to think you must have lost yourselves; and a nice time we had of it till your messenger arrived at eight.  It was no use sending out to look for you on the hills.  But I went out with a party, with two or three men to guide us, to the end of a valley, up which a path went; beyond that there was no going, for one couldn’t see one’s hand.  I stayed there an hour, firing off guns once a minute, and as there was no reply was sure that you must be a good distance off, wherever you were; so there was nothing to do but to come back and hope you had found shelter somewhere.  Come in, lad; I have got some hot lunch waiting for you.  Come in, Mr. Fitzgibbon.  It’s lucky I didn’t catch you yesterday, or I should have considered it my duty to have hung you forthwith for decoying his majesty’s troops among the hills.”

“Well, Conway, you didn’t bargain for all this when you offered to change places with me,” Lieutenant Desmond said when they were seated at table.

“No; but now it’s all over I am glad I did change, in spite of the tramp we had.  It has been an adventure, and beside, it was a good thing to learn how best to get out of a fog.”

“How did you manage, Conway?” Captain O’Connor asked; “for once lost in such a fog as that on those hills there really does not seem anything to be done.”

Ralph related the various steps he had taken, and how, eventually, they had come upon running water and followed it down to a road.

“Well, I really think you have done remarkably well, youngster.  I shouldn’t be surprised if we have some more tramps before us, for I had a letter this morning from the colonel saying that the fellow known as the red Captain, a notorious scoundrel who has been with his gang committing all sorts of atrocities in Galway, has made the place too hot for him at last, and is reported to have made his way down to the south coast, somewhere in this direction; and we are ordered to keep a sharp lookout for him.  He is an unmitigated ruffian, and a desperate one.  He has shot several constables who have tried to capture him, and as he has three or four men with him nearly as bad as himself I expect we shall have some trouble with him.  There has been a reward of a hundred pounds for his capture for a long time, but so far without success.  One man, whom he suspected rightly or wrongly of intending to betray him, he killed by fastening the door of his cottage and then setting the thatch alight; and the man, his wife, and four children were burned to death.”

That evening, just as dinner was over, the sergeant came in and said that a woman wished to speak to the captain.

“What does she want, sergeant?”

“She won’t say what she wants, sir; only that she wishes to speak to you privately.”

“Show her in then, sergeant.”