“No,” he whispered, “what of him?”
“I saw him hanged to his own yard-arm in the Pacific Ocean, Jasper, and he went to his own place with the lives of many an innocent man upon his black soul. Take care you do not follow him. Shame upon you, cousin, for the trick you played me!”
“You came between me and the girl I loved,” he said fiercely. “All is fair in love and war.”
“Coward!” I said. “And liar, too! I never came between her and thee, for she had never a word to give such a black-hearted villain as thou hast proved thyself. And now, what is to prevent me from taking my revenge upon thee, Jasper?”
“This,” he said, very suddenly, whipping out his rapier. “This, Master Humphrey. Home you have come again, worse luck, and have no doubt done your best to injure me in more quarters than one, but you shall not live to enjoy either land, or title, or sweetheart, for you shall die here and now.”
And with that he came pressing upon me with a sudden fury that was full of murderous intent.
Now I had no weapon by me save a stout cudgel which I had cut from a coppice by the wayside that morning, and this you would think was naught when set against a rapier. Nevertheless I made such play with it, that presently I knocked Jasper’s weapon clean out of his hand so that he could not recover it. And after that I seized him by the throat and beat with my cudgel until he roared and begged for mercy, beseeching me not to kill him.
“Have no fear, cousin,” said I, still laying on to him, “I will not kill thee, for I would have thee repent of all thy misdeeds.”
And with that I gave him two or three sound cuts and then flung him from me against the wall, where he lay groaning and cursing me.
After that I saw Jasper Stapleton no more. He never showed his face in Beechcot again, and in a few days his mother, Dame Barbara, disappeared also; and so they vanished out of my life, and I was glad of it, for they had worked me much mischief.