What do you say, shall I tell him ?" "Do, by all means," Rupert said.

"I have warned Hugh of what I am going to do, and he would never forgive me if I did not take him; but if your cousin will go, all the better, for he will know far better than I how to fix the petards.

You can tell him I shall be glad to act under his orders; and if it succeeds, and he likes to let it be known the part which he has played in the matter--which indeed would seem to be within the scope of his proper duties, he being an engineer--I shall be glad for him to do so, it always being understood that he does not mention my name in any way." Half-an-hour later Dillon entered, to say that his cousin agreed heartily to take a part in the adventure, and that he would shortly come up to arrange the details with Rupert.

Rupert had met Gerald Dillon before, and knew him to be as wild, adventurous, and harum-scarum a young officer as his cousin Pat; and in half-an-hour's talk the whole matter was settled.
Gerald would take two petards, which weighed some twenty pounds each, to his tent, one by one.

Hugh should fetch them in a basket, one by one, to the river bank, at the spot where a balk of wood had been washed ashore by some recent floods.