"
"_Oh, mon Dieu! mais c'est impossible_."
"Impossible!" replied O'Brien; "was that the answer I gave your sister
in her trouble?"
"_Au moins c'est fort difficile_."
"That's quite another concern; but with your husband a pilot, I should
think a great part of the difficulty removed."
"My husband! I've no power over him," replied the woman, putting the
apron up to her eyes.
"But one hundred louis may have," replied O'Brien.
"There is truth in that," observed the woman, after a pause, "but what
am I to do, if they come to search the house?"
"Send us out of it, until you can find an opportunity to send us to
England. I leave it all to you--your sister expects it from you."
"And she shall not be disappointed, if God helps us," replied the woman,
after a short pause: "but I fear you must leave this house and the town
also to-night."
"How are we to leave the town?"
"I will arrange that; be ready at four o'clock, for the gates are shut
at dusk. I must go now, for there is no time to be lost."
"We are in a nice mess now, O'Brien," observed I, after the woman had
quitted the room.
"Devil a bit, Peter; I feel no anxiety whatever, except at leaving such
good quarters."
We packed up all our effects, not forgetting our two blankets, and
waited the return of the hostess. In about an hour she entered the room.
"I have spoken to my husband's sister, who lives about two miles on the
road to Middelburg. She is in town now, for it is market-day, and you
will be safe where she hides you.
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