Bull Garnet fell back in his saddle. He would rather have met a dozen robbers. By the voice he recognised a man whom he had once well known, and had good cause to know;—through his outrage upon whom, he had left the northern counties; the man whom he had stricken headlong down a coal–shaft, as the leader of rebellion, the night after Pearl was christened, nigh twenty years ago.
“Yes, I know you; Jupp your name is. Small credit it is to know you.”
“And smarler still to know you, Bull Garnet. Try your pistol thing, if you like. You must have rare stommick, I should think, to be up for another murder.”
“Issachar, I am sorry for you. Do you call it a murder to keep such a fellow as you off?”
“No, I dunna carl that a murder, because I be arl alive. But I do carl a murder what you did to young Clayton Nowell.”
“Fool, what do you know of it? Let go my horse, I say. You know pretty well what I am.”
“I know you haʼnʼt much patience, govʼnor, and be arlways in a hurry.”
Jupp hesitated, but would not be beaten, whatever might be the end of it.
“I am in no hurry now, Jupp; I will listen to all you have to say. But not with your hand on my bridle.”
“There goeth free then. Arl knows you be no liar.”