“I think, sir,” said I, “this paper is yours.”
“I thank you,” he answered, taking it, and eyeing me. “Is there anything, besides, you wished to say?”
“A great deal, maybe, if your name be Anthony.”
“Master Anthony Killigrew is my name, sir; now serving under Lord Bernard Stewart in His Majesty’s troop of guards.”
“And mine is Jack Marvel,” said I. “Of the Yorkshire Marvels?”
“Why, yes; though but a shoot of that good stock, transplanted to Cumberland, and there sadly withered.”
“’Tis no matter, sir,” said he politely; “I shall be proud to cross swords with you.”
“Why, bless your heart!” I cried out, full of laughter at this childish punctilio; “d’ye think I came to fight you?”
“If not, sir”—and he grew colder than ever—“you are going a cursed roundabout way to avoid it.”
Upon this, finding no other way out of it, I began my tale at once: but hardly had come to the meeting of the two men on the bowling-green, when he interrupts me politely——