"Oh," laughed the man, "Black Geordie kens the road as well as me. With a Black Geordie in front, and a Red Geordie behind, it's not many spooks will trouble us. I'll go and whisper a word in the old fellow's lug, and send him on. He'll be past the Hag before I catch him up. He should have been a general in the army—that old fellow—for he comes clean out o' all messes."
He went to the door, and soon there was the sound of hoofs upon the road. Joel saw the string of beasts disappear into the mist as they went on up the pass. Their master came back to the kitchen, and with him entered Peter Fleming.
"Another glass, mistress," cried Red Geordie. "One for each of us; glasses all round; a stirrup cup for me, and a happy union for you. Your health, Master Joel Hart! and school-master Peter, here's to you!"
At Peter's entrance Joel's haughtiness vanished, and with it went the white whisht-look that had caused the dame anxiety. His eyes began to burn, and his lips twitched. Colour mounted to his brow, and concentrated into two red patches upon his cheek-bones. He got up from his seat, in the furthest corner of the ingle-nook, and moved nearer to Peter, looking at him with a gaze that roused suspicions in Red Geordie's mind.
He thought of the rumours that were flying about, concerning these two men. Rumours were never to be relied upon—twenty years following the pack-horses had shown him their inconsequence. He had an intimate knowledge of the manner in which they grew, as they rolled from village to village, himself being an active agent in starting them upon their mad careers.
He watched Joel intently, and scrubbed his upstanding whiskers with a rasping sound. Peter might not know it, but hate was the fire that glittered in Hart's eyes, hate was the colour that painted his wan cheeks, hate made his lips twitch, and drew him from his corner to the other end of the bench, for like love it finds satisfaction in being near the object of its passion.
"Good Lord!" he said to himself. "Here's enough gunpowder to blow us all up."
Then he turned to Peter.
"And how's your bonny wife, school-master?" said he. "You should have brought her with you to make a little sunshine in the Girdlestone, such a dim, dark day as this is! A bonny face is always a bonny face, and worth looking at, even when it does belong to another man."
Joel scowled.