“Ay, that will I; but he’ll have two of you floored, another strangled, and the fourth half-skinned before I can get him to stop.”
“I don’t half like it,” said the clarionet anxiously.
“Pooh! pooh!” exclaimed the key-bugle, “we’ll be more than a match for him; come on; it’s worth riskin’ for twenty-five bob.”
“Hear! hear!” cried the trombone.
“Well, then, enter,” said Gildart, pushing open the door, and holding it while the band filed into the passage. He followed them and closed the door.
In a short time Haco Barepoles made his appearance. He also passed through the village unobserved, and, entering the cottage, closed the door. Thereafter he proceeded to make himself comfortable. The “boodwar” was empty—at least of human beings, though there was the Dutch clock with the horrified countenance in the corner, and the new clock near it, and the portraits and the great four-poster, and all the other articles of elegance and luxury with which Mrs Gaff had filled her humble dwelling.
“A queer place,” muttered the mad skipper in a soft voice to himself, as he moved about the room, poked up the fire, and made preparations for spending the night. “Gaff wouldn’t know the old cabin—humph! but it’s all done out o’ kindness; well, well, there’s no accountin’ for women, they’re paridoxies. Hallo! this here closet didn’t use to be bolted, but it’s bolted now. Hows’ever here’s the loaf and the tea-pot an’ the kettle. Now, Mrs Gaff, you’re an attentive creetur, nevertheless you’ve forgot bilin’ water, an’, moreover, there an’t no water in the house. Ah, here’s a bucket; that’ll do; I’ll go to the well an’ help myself; it’s well that I can do it,” said Haco, chuckling at his own pun with great satisfaction as he went out to the back of the house.
There was a sudden, though not loud, sound of hollow brass chinking under the four-post bed.
“Now then, can’t you keep still?” said the clarionet in a hoarse whisper.
“It’s cramp in my leg,” growled the trombone. “I’d have had to come out if he hadn’t guv me this chance.”