"We call it mince-meat now. None of your Christmases for us, or any other Masses. None of Red Rome for us, I say. Banbury kills any man who talks of Masses."
"We've blundered somehow, Kit," whispered Michael nonchalantly.
"Say, do you stand for the King?" asked the Roundhead. "Yes or no—do you stand for the King?"
"'Say, do you stand for the King?'"
"Why, yes," said Kit. "Come on, you six crop-headed louts."
This was the end of Kit's solemnity, his over-serious attention to Prince Rupert's needs. And then they were in the thick of it, and the weight of the onset bore them down. When the battle ended—the table overturned, and three of the Roundheads under it—when Kit and Michael could do no more, and found themselves prisoners in the hands of the remaining three, the landlord, sleek and comfortable, bustled in.
"I trust there is no quarrel, gentlemen?" he entreated.
"None, as you see," said Michael airily. "We had a jest, host, about your Christmas pie. They tell me none says Mass in Banbury because the town is altogether heathen."
So then a blow took him unawares, and when Kit and he woke next day, they found themselves in the town's prison.