Several minutes transpired before he looked up; and his face, though still impressed with an air of dejection, was then more composed, and his eyes less clouded. Casting a glance around, he perceived that, though his impression had been otherwise, he was not the only inmate of the churchyard, as a man stood on the path before him who shared in the possession. He was of the middle degree of stature, stoutly built, and apparently, to judge from his already grizzled hair, about forty years of age. His countenance might in early life have been prepossessing; but either from care or dissipation, or perhaps from both, it was now haggard and stern, and calculated more to excite suspicion, than to command respect. There was, too, an unnatural brilliancy in his eye, which, taken in connection with his shaggy brows, and long and neglected locks, that peeped out from the brim of his slouched hat, imparted to his looks an excessive wildness, very far from being becoming. The impressions created by these causes were confirmed, to a certain extent, by his attire, which was slovenly and mean, and betokened no less an acquaintance with poverty, than a habit of neglecting and contemning the most essential duties of the toilet.
Directly this person, on his turning round from the grave, incurred his notice, our young cavalier sprang to his feet, and, with some degree of chagrin, prepared to retire from the churchyard. Before he could carry his design into effect, however, or had even taken a single step towards its execution, the intruder interposed, and, by a few brief words, made him pause.
“What ho! Master Hildebrand, is it thou I have been dogging so close?” he said.
The cavalier, though evidently taken somewhat aback, turned a glance of earnest inquiry on the speaker, and, after a moment’s pause, replied—“Thou knowest me?”
“’Tis more than ten years since I last saw thee,” answered the other, “and thou hadst then, if I mind me truly, scarcely seen thy fourteenth summer, and yet I remember thee right well.”
“By my troth, thy face strikes me familiarly,” resumed the cavalier; “but I need hardly go back so far, methinks, to call it to my remembrance. Thou mayst thank thy horse that he showed me good heels last night, or thou wouldst now, mayhap, have been less at thine ease than thou seemest to be.”
The robber—for he was one of the two robbers who had attacked Sir Edgar de Neville on the previous evening—faintly smiled as he replied,—“And does thy memory bear thee no further back, Master Hildebrand? What the good year! can such a brief time as this, which has barely made thee a man, efface the memories of a whole boyhood? Then, in good sooth, Master Hildebrand, I am not the man to claim thy acquaintance.”
“Hold!” exclaimed the cavalier, springing forward, and seizing the robber by the arm; “thou seemest to know me, and, by my conscience, now I behold thee nearer, thy face doth strike me like an old friend’s; who art thou?”
“When thy poor old father,” answered the robber, with some emotion, “had been burned for heresy, in the reign of scarlet Mary, it was my hands laid his ashes in yonder grave. When your mother was houseless, with shame on her brow, and the pang of sorrow in her heart, it was I gave her a refuge, and held her safe from the hellish Papists. When her saintly heart beat its last, it was my hands laid her there, by the side of your father. Nay, hear me out! I cherished thee, their offspring: such lore as I had knowledge of I taught thee, and would, in time, have had thee better taught; but—”
“You lost me, good Bernard,” said the cavalier, seizing him by the hand.