"Always an important question to ask. I am presently engaged in a sort of duel with the Viscount Bolingbroke—the same chap you have to thank for your recent travails in Tower-dungeons. In a duel, it is customary for each participant to have a second: a friend to stand behind him to back him up. The second rarely has to do anything. You may think of the Whig Association’s battalions as my second. As for Bolingbroke, he has always had the Queen’s Messengers, and now, too, he has much of your old Regiment in his pocket. Most of the other regiments are too cowed to stand against him. It is important that I not be cowed, Sergeant Shaftoe. Having an army in Ravenscar gives me a warm feeling."