I broke off, for she had come to a stop, wringing her hands and looking in my face most dolefully.
“Oh, dear—oh, dear! Jack, we have had such merry times: and you are spoiling all the fun!”
We follow’d the road after this very moodily; for Delia, whom I had made sharer of the rebels’ secret, agreed that no time was to be lost in reaching Bodmin, that lay a good thirty miles to the southwest. Night fell and the young moon rose, with a brisk breeze at our backs that kept us still walking without any feeling of weariness. Captain Billy had given me at parting a small compass, of new invention, that a man could carry easily in his pocket; and this from time to time I examin’d in the moonlight, guiding our way almost due south, in hopes of striking into the main road westward. I doubt not we lost a deal of time among the byways; but at length happen’d on a good road bearing south, and follow’d it till daybreak, when to our satisfaction we spied a hill in front, topp’d with a stout castle, and under it a town of importance, that we guess’d to be Launceston.
By this, my comrade and I were on the best of terms again; and now drew up to consider if we should enter the town or avoid it to the west, trusting to find a breakfast in some tavern on the way. Because we knew not with certainty the temper of the country, it seem’d best to choose this second course: so we fetch’d around by certain barren meadows, and thought ourselves lucky to hit on a road that, by the size, must be the one we sought, and a tavern with a wide yard before it and a carter’s van standing at the entrance, not three gunshots from the town walls.
“Now Providence hath surely led us to breakfast,” said Delia, and stepped before me into the yard, toward the door.
I was following her when, inside of a gate to the right of the house, I caught the gleam of steel, and turn’d aside to look.
To my dismay there stood near a score of chargers in this second court, saddled and dripping with sweat. My first thought was to run after Delia; but a quick surprise made me rub my eyes with wonder—
’Twas the sight of a sorrel mare among them—a mare with one high white stocking. In a thousand I could have told her for Molly.
Three seconds after I was at the tavern door, and in my ears a voice sounding that stopp’d me short and told me in one instant that without God’s help all was lost.
’Twas the voice of Captain Settle speaking in the taproom; and already Delia stood, past concealment, by the open door.