said I, "but none so deep as you think."
"Would you go back on your bargain?" he asked, bending his brows on me.
"Nay," said I, "I will take no unfair advantage of any man, huff or Bishop. We shall stand both of us where we stood, you and I."
"And where is that?" he asked as quietly as before.
"Upon the heath," I answered. "I had you under my hands, you and t'other, and there were ten guineas atween you, so ye said. Well," said I, "I will have those guineas and cry quits with you."
"Ten guineas, was it?" he says, considering—"ah, so 'twas. I would not cheat you, Captain Ryder," and smiling softly he drew a bag from his pocket. "I perceive you to be a man of honour," says he, equably. "I love to do business so! Sure, if there were more such at Court! Ten guineas, say you, Captain? Keep your tally," and he paid out the pictures on the table afore him.
I took them up with a nod, where I sat, but the girl, Mrs Barbara, watched us from the distance, standing with her arm resting upon a tall chair to support her.
"Then here's your good health, Sir Gilbert," said I, wondering what method he would take; for I was sure enough that he had a design against me.
"Now," says he, "we are quits, as you say; and that leaves us free, you to go your way, and me to ask the offices of the law to recover that which is stolen of me. Nick," cries he in a clear voice, and at the word the young fellow's nose was through the door. "An officer from the justice, Nick," he says. "I have been robbed," and smiled pleasantly in my face.
Now I will confess that this predicament had not occurred to me, for to say the truth, I had a thought that he would fall on me with his weapon, which I minded not, being as good a swordsman as ever any chamber knight in town. And on that astonishment followed also these sequels in my mind—that if so be he carried out the plan he had, I should not only go to the jug, but he would have the wife that was maid. This put me in a frenzy, yet I dared not attack him with Nick outside, and I knew not what other also. So, very quickly making my resolution, I broke out a-laughing, and said I,—
"You have me held, your worship, by Heaven you have. Yet I was but jesting. Am I a fool to peril a hundred guineas for a chitty face? Come, here are your ten guineas. Pay me down my price, and there stands your madam for you."
He cocked his eye on Mrs Barbara, smiling the while, as if pleased with his victory, but mightily civil.
"Madam," he says, "you will see that I have no responsibility in this insult. 'Tis the gentleman's manner, no doubt. I can but think myself fortunate to deliver you of his custody."
But she stood where she was, white and fearful, throwing her troubled eyes about; and part of her terror was no doubt feigned, but I think that in part it was earnest. She knew not, poor wretch, what I would be at.
But, Lord love you, I had no fears. "The hundred guineas," says I, "and I pray Mr Nick for witness," for I was resolved to get that young bantam into the room forthwith.
"Ho, Nick!" says Sir Gilbert, merrily. "Come in for a witness to me," and in steps that young and elegant ninny, looking very sour and sleepy. Sir Gilbert pulled out his bag and counted the money to me. "'Slife," says he, with a frown, "'tis like the thirty pieces," and then he shrugged his shoulders.
I took 'em up one by one, and with the very movement in which the last was taken to my pouch out slipped my sword, and,—
"Defend ye, defend ye," said I, "or I will run ye through. D'ye think to get even with Dick Ryder, you fool, you?"
Sir Gilbert started back and lugged out his iron, and Master Nick leaped forward.
"Let be, Nick, let be," says t'other. "The fellow shall have his way, devil take him! He shall feed the crows some way."
But in the course of my life I have never come upon any, save one, that was more than the match of Dick Ryder, and so he soon found. For he plied his point elegantly, but with no proper freedom; and presently down comes I with my favourite twist and took him through the left breast. He fell a-bleeding to the floor.
"Curse you!" he cried and gasped. But Nick then sprang at my throat with his weapon drawn; yet was I no such lambkin to be took unawares by such a raw smooth-face.
"What!" says I, "d'ye fancy that such as I will take thought to drill holes in veal? Not I, young master, not I," and dodging his point I drove the hilt of my rapier hard upon his forehead. He dropped like a shot partridge; and giving neither any further thought I turned to the lady.
"Fly!" says I, "down the stairway, mistress, for I have not a blink of wind more within me."
She ran in terror, and I clattered after her, being afraid lest the noise might have woke those in the inn. And so, indeed, it proved; for when we were got into the road, where Calypso stood, a commotion broke out behind us, and I heard Sir Gilbert's voice raised in angry oaths. 'Twas the work of a moment to set the lady on the mare and to leap after her. Calypso has carried heavier burdens than that, yet she has carried none so gallantly or so speedily. And thus it had grown to be scarce one o'clock in the morning on that frosty night when we reached Guildford in company, and drew up at the Red Lion.
THE DRAPER'S NIECE
'Twas late of night when I reached Wimbledon Common, out of the West, where I had been patrolling the roads for some two months or more, and with mighty little success, as it chanced that year. I love the West Country, not only because I have, as a rule, found there fat pockets jogging home untimely on a nag, or fine noblemen in rich chaises, very proud but tender to pick, but I have also a sentimental leaning towards that part, and that's the truth I will not deny. There is some that hanker after the Great North Road, and boast that there is no better toby-ground than 'twixt Stevenage and Grantham, while I have even known 'em to set up Finchley Common or Hounslow for choice. Old Irons, who never had much self-respect, and was not above turning common crib-cracker if it so served him, was wont to go no further than Finchley when he was lacking a goldfinch or two.
"Sink me!" says he in my presence once to the landlord of the King's Head, who spoke of his score there, "I will pay you to-morrow, and be hanged to you!" The which he did, sure enough, by a visit to Finchley and not so much as a charged pistol. That was never my way. I never could abide such sport. Give me a creditable fellow that shows fight and gives your wits some exercise. There's the true spirit in which to take the life of the road. I would not give a pint of mulled ale for it else.
But the West is after my heart, being big and populous and swarming with squires and comfortable warm folk. I know the North Road, and was once very well known there myself, and celebrated on the Yorkshire moors, a confounded cold, uncivil place. Indeed, there are few parts of the kingdom I have not traversed in my time. Well, I was newly out of the West that May night, but on this occasion in no very good humour, as you may imagine, when I say that I had been forced to leave a belt of guineas behind at Devizes—so close upon me were the traps. Indeed, I was very nearly taken in the night, all owing to the treachery of an innkeeper, roast him! 'Twas a fine, mild night, and I was for lying in Clerkenwell at a house I knew, but I had reached no further than Roehampton Lane, when of a sudden I reined in, for I remembered an inn there that I had sometimes used, and, to say the truth, I was thirsty.
"Well," thinks I, "maybe I will lie here and maybe not. I will let fortune decide," and I was turning the mare into the lane, when something comes up quick in the thick of the darkness, and rushes upon Calypso's rump.
The mare started and backed into the hedge, and I raised my voice and cursed, as you may guess.
"Why," says I, "you toad, you muckrake, you dung-fork—" and the Lord knows where I should ha' gotten to if a gleam of white in the blackness had not in that instant disclosed to me the blunderer. 'Twas a woman, or, at least, a slip so young and silly that maybe she should not be so styled; and I had no sooner made that out and ceased in the middle of my objurgations, than I made another discovery. It was her voice that did it, for no doubt she was mightily in terror, seeing me so wrathful and the night being so black and lonely.
"Oh, sir," she calls in a trembling voice, "I did not see—I—" and here she broke a-weeping.
Well, Dick Ryder is not the man to stand by while