"I'll tell my wife about it," said he. He tried to clap O'Toole on the
back, and missing him fell forward with his face on the table. The next
minute he was snoring. Misset walked round the table and deftly picked
his pockets. There was a package in one of them superscribed to "Prince
Taxis, the Governor of Trent." Misset deliberately broke the seal and
read the contents. He handed the package to O'Toole, who read it, and
then flinging it upon the ground danced upon it. Misset went out of the
room and found Wogan and Gaydon keeping watch by Clementina's door. To
them he spoke in a whisper.
"The fellow brings letters from General Heister to the Governor of Trent
to stop us at all costs. But his letters are destroyed, and he's lying
dead-drunk on the table."
The three men quickly concerted a plan. The Princess must be roused; a
start must be made at once; and O'Toole must be left behind to keep a
watch upon the courier, Wogan rapped at the door and waked Clementina;
he sent Gaydon to the stables to bribe the ostlers, and with Misset went
down to inform O'Toole.
O'Toole, however, was sitting with his eyes closed and his head nodding,
surrounded by scraps of the letter which he had danced to pieces. Wogan
shook him by the shoulder, and he opened his eyes and smiled fatuously.
"He means to tell his wife," he said with a foolish gurgle of laughter.
"He must be an ass. I don't think if I had a wife I should tell her.
Would you, Wogan, tell your wife if you had one? Misset wouldn't tell
his wife."
Misset interrupted him.
"What have you drank since I went out of the room?" he asked roughly. He
took up the water-jug and turned it topsy-turvy. It was quite empty.
"Only water," said O'Toole, dreamily, and he laughed again. "Now I
wouldn't mind telling my wife that," said he.
Misset let him go and turned with a gesture of despair to Wogan.
"I poured my flask out into the water-bottle. It was full of burnt
Strasbourg brandy, of double strength. It is as potent as opium. Neither
of them will have his wits before to-morrow. It will not help us to
leave O'Toole to guard the courier."
"And we cannot take him," said Wogan. "There is the Princess to be
thought of. We must leave him, and we cannot leave him alone, for his
neck's in danger,--more than in danger if the courier wakes before him."