The stranger chuckled afresh as he buried his head in his pewter-pot. And Long Murgatroyd came striding in.
“Dry, Murgatroyd?” asked the widow.
“Like a kiln.”
“I never knew a man so punctual, as you might say, to a thirst. Tend it, you do, as a woman tends her babby.”
Long Murgatroyd was in one of his better moods, and gave as much as he took in the way of banter before settling himself in the corner by the ingle-nook. Then he glanced at the stranger.
“Where do you come from?” he asked.
“Bless me, the landlady was putting that same question to me a minute since.”
“Aye,” snapped the widow, “and all the answer I got for my trouble was that he’d nearly journeyed further than he relished—journeyed to——”
“You needn’t be squeamish. Hell was what I said—if there is such a place.”
Murgatroyd turned on him with a sudden snarl. “There is. I don’t need to travel, for I’m in it.”