lot of broken turf with which a wide floor had been overlaid.
Boards and timbers were cut away, and the grave dug beneath them.
I saw one face among others in the gloom beyond the candle
rows--that of his Lordship. He was coming up a little flight of
stairs to where I stood. He moved the candles, making a small
passage, and came up to me.

"You're a brave man," said he, in that low, careless tone of his.

"And you a coward," was my answer, for the sight of him had made me
burn with anger.

"Don't commit yourself on a point like that," said he, quickly,
"for, you know, we are not well acquainted. I like your pluck, and
I offer you what is given to few here--an explanation."

He paused, lighting a cigarette. I stood looking at him. The cold
politeness of manner with which he had taken my taunt, his perfect
self-mastery, filled me with wonder. He was no callow youth, that
man, whoever he might be. He was boring at the floor with the end
of a limber cane as he continued to address me.

"Now, look here," he went on, with a little gesture of his left
hand, between the fingers of which a cigarette was burning. "You
are now in the temple of a patriotic society acting with no letters
patent, but in the good cause of his Most Excellent Majesty King
George III, to whom be health and happiness."

As he spoke the name he raised his hat, and a cheer came from all
sides of us.