Again his shin was kicked, and Widow Mathison took up the tale they were spinning round the stranger like a web.
“She’s of the better sort, you see, and our Garsykes Men are rough. No wonder that she smiled at the likes of you. I’d have done as much myself when I was younger.”
“The widow’s right. Nita’s too trim a lass for such as us. That’s why she looks over our heads when we think o’ courting.”
“You don’t court properly, then,” said Will o’ Wisp, with a wink of infinite zest and roguery. “There’s three ways of courting a pretty wench, and only three.”
“Oh, aye?”
“The first is, be sure of winning. So’s the second. And the third——”
“What’s the third?” prompted Widow Mathison.
“Be sure of winning,” Will o’ Wisp chuckled, and buried his face in the pewter-pot.
He was so pleased with the hum of laughter that answered his idle pleasantry—pleased to be safe among Lost Folk again after hunger and thirst among the righteous—and his tongue wagged freely.
They plied him with strong ale that night, and Murgatroyd, when he left him sleeping on the long-settle, went laughing out of the tavern door. He would watch another go through what he had suffered—would watch, and gloat.