"Strong wine and beautiful women," I said.
"Did you. I am rather dull of hearing."
"You're a dull-witted fellow altogether to my thinking."
"It is most true, sir. I am so dull that I cannot see the wit in your conversation."
"I can cuff almost as vigorously as Sayers," said the man a little angrily, when his companion on the other side of Martin laughed.
"I will believe it without demonstration," said Martin, cringing in his saddle. "You frighten me, and now I have lost my stirrups. I am no rider to get on without them. I shall fall. Of your kindness, gentlemen, find me my stirrups."
"Plague on you for a fool," said one.
"A blessing on you if you get my feet into the stirrups."
"Stop, then, a moment."
Martin pulled up, and the cavalcade went on. The two men, one on either side, brought their horses close to Martin's, and bent down to find the stirrups. Martin suddenly gave both horses the spur in the flanks with a backward fling of his heels, and at the same time struck each man a heavy blow on his lowered head. The horses sprang aside, one rider falling in the roadway, the other stumbling with his animal into the ditch by the roadside. The next instant Martin had whipped round his own horse, and was galloping back along the road.