RAVENSBANE [Falling on his knees and bowing his head.] O God! I am so contemptible!
[Enter, at door back, Goody Rickby; her blacksmith garb is hidden under a dingy black mantle with peaked hood.]
DICKON Good verse, too, for a parody! [Ruminating, raises one arm rhetorically above Ravensbane.]
“Farewell, happy fields Where joy forever dwells! Hail, horrors; hail, Infernal world! and thou, profoundest Hell, Receive thy new possessor.”
GOODY RICKBY [Seizing his arm.] Dickon!
DICKON Hullo! You, Bess!
GOODY RICKBY There’s not a minute to lose. Justice Merton and the neighbours have ended their conference at Minister Dodge’s, and are returning here.
DICKON What! coming back in the dark? They ran away in the daylight as if the ghosts were after ’em.
GOODY RICKBY [At the window.] I see their lanterns down the road.
DICKON Well, let ’em come. We’re ready.