"Oh, pot it, must we go back then?"
"Perish the thought! Never let it be said that Robin Hood and his Merry Men turned their backs on any peril, however dire. We will creep round them with stealthy, noiseless tread, and see if the varlets are doing their duty as nobly as they should, or, like the greedy Squirms, merely sleeping off the effects of pancakes."
The suggestion, though not so much to the Merry Men's liking as Flenton's projected exploration of the cottage, nevertheless held promise of a little mild adventure, and they acted on it. Creeping from bush to bush with scarcely a sound, they came at last in sight of two plain-clothes policemen, dressed as builder's labourers, sitting on some dried bracken-leaves, and looking anything but gay.
Probably they had been forbidden to speak, for they were conversing rather guiltily in low tones, the burden of their complaint being that though they had pipes and tobacco in their pockets they dared not light them.
"This is a daft and perishin' job," said one of them. "I'd like to wring the neck of Fluffy Jim for stumbling across them pewter pots and coins."
"Nay, that's ungrateful," retorted his mate. "We each got a quid of Old Wykeham's money out of the job."
"Bah! It'll cost me more than any quid to sweat this cold out of my bones. My teeth chatter like a baboon's. Got a drop or two left in your flask, Sam?"
"Drained it dry half-an-hour since, Bill."
"And it'll be two more floggin' hours afore we're relieved from duty. I'm fed up. I'll resign from the Force, pension or no pension, and take to navvyin'."
"No use, Bill. Once a policeman, always a policeman. It's in the blood."