A CONFESSION 339

all along Jacobite, and now that he and the Tories are in
power and the Whigs are out of favour, Marlborough could
if he chose do very much for us. It is no longer a crime
to be a Jacobite, and indeed they say that the Tories are
intending to upset the act of succession and bring in a
fresh one making James Stuart the successor to Anne.

“Still, even if we had succeeded so far by Marlborough’s
influence that our fathers could have returned to England
without fear of being tried for their lives, I do not think
that either of them would have come so long as the charge
of having been concerned in an assassination plot was hang-
ing over them. Now that they are cleared, and can come
back with honour, it will be different altogether. It will
be glorious news for them. Of course we shall start as
soon as we get the official communication that the estates
are restored. We shall only have to go back to them, for,
as you know, yours is the only estate that has been granted
to anyone else. The others were put up for sale, but no
one would bid for them, as the title-deeds would have been
worth nothing if King James came over. So they have
only been let to farmers, and we can walk straight in again
without dispossessing anyone.”

“T don’t know what to do about John Dormay,” Charlie
said. “here is no doubt that from what the judge said
they will prosecute him.”

So they ought to,” Harry broke in. “He has striven
by false swearing to bring innocent men to the scaffold.
Why, it is worse than murder.”

“TI quite agree with you, Harry, and if I were in your
place I would say just as strongly as you do that he ought
to be hung; but you see I am differently situated. The
man isakinsman of ours by marriage. My cousin Celia
has been always most kind to me, and is my nearest rela-
tive after my father. She has been like an aunt, and in-
deed did all she could to supply the place of a mother to