"Alack! yes, sir, few travellers come to the lone widow's door, and it's an out o' the way place: wouldn't your honour like some supper, or a stoop of wine, or, mayhap, a glass of brandy?—it is useful these raw nights; or a rasher and eggs?"
"Are you quite certain there is no other in the house, and that your son is really not returned?" he again inquired, heedless of her invitation.
"Why should I deceive your honour?—am I not old, and would you that I should so sin against the Lord?"
"You were not always thus piously given," replied the youth, smiling. "Know you aught of this token?" and he united his hands after a particular fashion: "heard you never the words——" and he whispered a short sentence into her ear: upon which she dropped a reverential courtesy, and, without reply, ascended, as quickly as her age and infirmities permitted, the ladder that led to Roupall's place of retreat. Ere she returned, however, accompanied by the trooper, another person had entered the dwelling. It was no other than her son Robin, for whom the gentleman had first inquired, and they were both engaged in such deep and earnest conversation, that neither noticed the addition to the party, until the old woman had thrown her arms around her son's neck, so as almost to stifle him with her caresses, seeming to lose all sense of the stranger's presence in the fulness of joy at the youth's return.
"There, mother, that will do; why, you forget I have been in London lately, and 'tis not the court fashion to rejoice and be glad. Besides, I have seen his Highness, and his Highness's daughters, and his Highness's sons, and drank, in moderation, with his Highness's servants: so, stand off, good mother, stand off!—'honour to whom honour.'" And Robin laid his finger on his nose, while a remarkable expression of cunning and shrewdness passed along his sharp and peculiar features.
As he busied himself with preparations for the guest's supper, it was impossible to avoid observing his quick and energetic movements, spare body, dwarfish stature, and long apish arms, that appeared in greater disproportion when viewed beside the now sedate and elevated carriage, the muscular and finely-developed form of the bulky trooper. And, in good sooth, it seemed that Roupall little relished the extraordinary civility shown to the new comer, both by mother and son. Had the stranger been disposed to hold any converse with him, matters might have been different; but he neither asked nor required information—sitting, after his return from the shed in which he had seen his horse sheltered, with his legs stretched out in front of the warm fire, his arms folded on his bosom, and his eyes fixed on the blazing wood that lent a brilliant light to the surrounding objects—giving a simple, though not uncourteous reply of "Yea," or "Nay," to the leading questions occasionally put to him by his rough, yet inquisitive companion. At length, when the rashers were dressed and deposited on the table, flanked on either side with a flagon of Canary and of Gascoigne, and the traveller had done ample justice to his cheer, he, with a conciliating smile and bow, wished the widow and Roupall "Good night," and followed Robin up the ladder, observing that his rest must be very brief, as he had occasion to start early next morning, and begging the good widow and her friend to finish the draught of her own excellent wine, to which he feared to render farther justice. Some time elapsed ere Robin returned; and when he did, he perceived that Roupall was in no gentle humour.
"Have you warmed the chicken's nest, and taken good and tender care of the gentle bird, according to orders, Robin? Gadzooks! I see so many cocks with hens' feathers now-a-days—sweet-scented Cavaliers, who could no more draw a trigger than they could mount the moon, that I think Hugh Dalton must line the Fire-fly with miniver to bring them safely over. A murrain take such fellows! say I—close-mouthed, long-eared scoundrels. D—n it! I love a frank heart——"
"And a bloody hand, Master Roupall."
"Stuff! stuff! Robin; few of either party can show clean hands these times; but does yon gallant come from over sea?"
"It might be that he dropped from the sky, for that is over the sea, you know."