"Two or three of them I can at least save from the grasp of these rascals," he said, "but I will take them all down on my tablets. What need was there for you," he went on after he had done this, "to run such risk as you did--for you would assuredly have been killed without mercy had they caught you spying upon them--when Simon, who you say was present, could have sent me full particulars of all that passed?"