‘First snatch his prey, or he’ll be making, God save us! a meal for a Kaiser, the brute.’
Guy called in the landlady, clapped down the score, and abused the wine.
‘Sir,’ said the landlady, ‘ours is but a poor inn, and we do our best.’
‘So you do,’ replied the Goshawk, softened; ‘and I say that a civil tongue and rosy smiles sweeten even sour wine.’
The landlady, a summer widow, blushed, and as he was stepping from the room, called him aside.
‘I thought you were one of that dreadful Werner’s band, and I hate him.’
Guy undeceived her.
‘He took my sister,’ she went on, ‘and his cruelty killed her. He persecuted me even in the lifetime of my good man. Last night he came here in the middle of the storm with a young creature bright as an angel, and sorrowful—’
‘He’s gone, you’re sure?’ broke in Guy.
‘Gone! Oh, yes! Soon as the storm abated he dragged her on. Oh! the way that young thing looked at me, and I able to do nothing for her.’