His meditations were, however, soon interrupted by the appearance of the washerwoman, who came staggering through the door that communicated with the kitchen, muttering execrations against the servants of the officers, who, by their waggery, had disturbed her slumbers before the fire. The sentinel understood enough of her maledictions to comprehend the case; but all his efforts to enter into conversation with the enraged woman were useless, and he suffered her to enter her room without explaining that it contained another inmate. The noise of her huge frame falling on the bed was succeeded by a silence that was soon interrupted by the renewed respiration of the peddler, and within a few minutes Harvey continued to breathe aloud, as if no interruption had occurred. The relief arrived at this moment.
The sentinel, who felt nettled at the contempt of the peddler, after communicating his orders, while he was retiring, exclaimed to his successor,—
“You may keep yourself warm by dancing, John; the peddler spy has tuned his fiddle, you hear, and it will not be long before Betty will strike up, in her turn.”
The joke was followed by a general laugh from the party, who marched on in performance of their duty. At this instant the door of the prison was opened, and Betty reappeared, staggering back again toward her former quarters.
“Stop,” said the sentinel, catching her by her clothes; “are you sure the spy is not in your pocket?”
“Can’t you hear the rascal snoring in my room, you dirty blackguard?” sputtered Betty, her whole frame shaking with rage. “And is it so ye would sarve a dacent famale, that a man must be put to sleep in the room wid her, ye rapscallion?”
“Pooh! Do you mind a fellow who’s to be hanged in the morning? You see he sleeps already; to-morrow he’ll take a longer nap.”
“Hands off, ye villain,” cried the washerwoman, relinquishing a small bottle that the trooper had succeeded in wresting from her. “But I’ll go to Captain Jack, and know if it’s orders to put a hang-gallows spy in my room; aye, even in my widowed bed, you tief!”
“Silence, old Jezebel!” said the fellow with a laugh, taking the bottle from his mouth to breathe, “or you will wake the gentleman. Would you disturb a man in his last sleep?”
“I’ll awake Captain Jack, you reprobate villain, and bring him here to see me righted; he will punish ye all, for imposing on a dacent widowed body, you marauder!”