His first thought was, had they caught the King? He banished it instantly. He had got past all that before he went to sleep. He would not go back, otherwise the last twenty-four hours had been lived in vain. He listened calmly for their near approach, but he still kept his chair by the side of the dead embers. There was no need for him to rise to let them in, as he remembered that he had not considered it necessary to secure the door before he went to sleep. What a transcendent thing it was to have a heart utterly without bodily fear! It was rather hard, though, that he should only be allowed to experience that pleasure for so short a period in his long life. However, it was very excellent even to have known it at all. He could hardly be said to have lived in vain.
The landlord, still in his chair by the dead fire, watched the kitchen door. He saw it open. He saw Captain Culpeper appear, stiff and cold with riding, and very morose. His men, stiff and cold and morose too, crowded in behind him. The landlord neither moved nor spoke; he seemed wholly indifferent to their entrance.
“The King is escaped!” said Captain Culpeper, eyeing him savagely.
“I knew it,” said the landlord, a little wearily. He closed his eyes; almost a smile came upon his white lips.
“Oh, you knew it!” said Captain Culpeper, with a grim satisfaction. “You knew it, did you! And how did you know it, fool and poltroon as you are?”
“Poltroon I am,” said the landlord, “a thousand times a poltroon; but I am no fool. I knew it because I knew it.”
“Bah!” said the soldier, “I have not the patience to talk with you. But I trust the man and the woman are still upstairs in their chamber.”
“They are not,” said the landlord; there was a note of triumph in his voice. “A company of smugglers bore them away half an hour after your departure.”
“And you allowed them to leave your inn, after what I had said to you?” said Culpeper, striving to control the fury that was shaking him from head to foot.
“I could not help myself,” said the landlord, indifferently.