“Then here we tarry for dinner,” said the young-looking man, gracefully swinging himself out of the saddle, a proceeding imitated by all the riders. “Take good heed of the horses, Bill,” he said, as a coloured servant came forward. “Wash Blueskin’s nose and let him cool somewhat before watering him.” He turned toward the door of the tavern, and this bringing Charles into vision again, he looked up at the painter to find himself being studied with so intent a gaze that he halted and returned the man’s stare.
“Art struck of a heap by the resemblance?” demanded the noisy officer.
“Go in, gentlemen,” replied the tall one. “Well, my man,” he continued to Charles, “ye change figureheads easily.”
“Ay, ’t is easier to get new figureheads than ’t is to be true to old ones.”
A grave, almost stern look came into the officer’s face, making it at once that of an older man. “Then ye think the old order best?” he asked, scanning the man with his steady blue eyes.
The bondsman put his hand on the signboard. “’T is safest to stick to an old figurehead until one can find a true leader,” he answered.
“And think you he is one?” demanded the officer, pointing at the signboard.
Charles laughed and laid a finger on the chin of royalty. “No man with so little of that was ever a leader,” he asserted. He reached down and picked up a different pot of paint from the one he had been using, dipped his brush in it, and with one sweep over the lower part of the face cleverly produced a chin of character. Then he took another colour and gave three or four deft touches to the lips, transforming the expressionless mouth into a larger one, but giving to it both strength and expression. “There is a beginning of a leader, I think,” he said.
“Thou art quick with thy brush and quick with thy eyes,” replied the man, smiling slightly and starting to go. In the doorway he turned and said with a sudden gravity, quite as much to himself as to the bondsman: “Please God that thou be as true in opinion.”
Left alone, the bondsman once more took his brush and broadened and strengthened the nose and forehead. Just as he had completed these, the tavern-keeper came bustling out of the door. “Wilt seek Joe Bagby an’ tell him tew git the Invincibles tewgether?” he cried. “He intended tew review ‘em tew-morrer fer the ginral, an’ their Lordships says they’ll see ’em go through—Why, strap me, man, what hast thou been at?”