They drank their bowl of punch and immediately set off for the St. Albans road.
"The Oxford road is nearer than the St. Albans. Why not take it?" asked
George.
"You said you were going to Edinburgh," returned Wentworth, "and, besides, the St. Albans road is our wager, and that is the one we'll take, unless you want to turn back and forfeit your stake."
To the St. Albans road they started, Crofts, Berkeley, and Wentworth walking perhaps two hundred yards in advance of Churchill and Hamilton. The rain was pouring down in torrents, and the night was so dark that Hamilton and Churchill could not see the advance guard, though they heard a deal of talking, laughing, and cursing ahead of them. This order of march was what Crofts and his friends desired, for of course the wager was not on their minds. They were hoping for something greater, and would have been glad to release Churchill and Hamilton had they offered to turn back. But lacking that good fortune, the valiant three evidently hoped to meet the coach and rob it before the others came up, in which case Crofts and his friends would deny the robbery, if accused, and would divide the gold into three parts instead of five.
When nearly two miles from the city, Crofts, Berkeley, and Wentworth met Roger's coach and delivered the attack as silently as possible. Just the manner in which it was done I have never learned, since Hamilton himself did not know the particulars of it, and Frances told me it happened so quickly that it was over almost before she knew it had begun. She said the horses had stopped, which was not a matter of surprise to her, as they had been resting every few minutes, and that a man wearing a mask entered the coach, rummaged the cushions, and was backing out with the bag of gold in his hand when Roger seized him.
The robber was almost out of the coach, but Roger clung to him with one hand while he drew his pistol with the other and fired. Then the man tossed the bag of gold to one of his friends on the road, drew his sword, thrust it in Roger's breast, and the poor old man fell back on the coach floor at my cousin's feet. She heard some one call to Noah: "Drive on if you value a whole skin!" and Noah, awaiting no second command, lashed the horses with his whip until they plunged forward at a clumsy gallop.
Hamilton and Churchill, being perhaps two hundred yards down the road, knew nothing of the trouble ahead till they heard the pistol shot, when they ran forward, supposing their drunken friends were fighting among themselves. They had not taken many steps when a coach passed them, moving rapidly. As it passed, George heard a woman scream faintly, but immediately the coach dashed out of sight. The light from Noah's lanthorn had fallen on Hamilton's face, and Frances had recognized the man of whom she had been thinking and dreaming all day.
I did not know, however, till long afterwards that she had seen him, nor did he suspect that she was in the coach.
When Hamilton and Churchill came up to the robbers, Hamilton asked:—
"What was the trouble?"