For a half-hour he lingered there, and for all that he used the occasion to let his mind stray over many a theme, his eyes were alert for the least movement among the shadows of the street. Reassured at last that the house was no longer being watched, he drew back, and closed the lattice.
Upstairs he found the Irishman seated in dejection upon his bed, awaiting him.
“Soul of my body!” cried Hogan ruefully, “I was never nearer being afraid in my life.”
Crispin laughed softly for answer, and besought of him the tale of what had passed.
“Tis simple enough, faith,” said Hogan coolly. “The landlord of The Angel hath a daughter maybe 'twas after her he named his inn—who owns a pair of the most seductive eyes that ever a man saw perdition in. She hath, moreover, a taste for dalliance, and my brave looks and martial trappings did for her what her bold eyes had done for me. We were becoming the sweetest friends, when, like an incarnate fiend, that loutish clown, her lover, sweeps down upon us, and, with more jealousy than wit, struck me—struck me, Harry Hogan! Soul of my body, think of it, Cris!” And he grew red with anger at the recollection. “I took him by the collar of his mean smock and flung him into the kennel—the fittest bed he ever lay in. Had he remained there it had been well for him; but the fool, accounting himself affronted, came up to demand satisfaction. I gave it him, and plague on it—he's dead!”
“An ugly tale,” was Crispin's sour comment.
“Ugly, maybe,” returned Hogan, spreading out his palms, “but what choice had I? The fool came at me, bilbo in hand, and I was forced to draw.'
“But not to slay, Hogan!”
“Twas an accident. Sink me, it was! I sought his sword-arm; but the light was bad, and my point went through his chest instead.”
For a moment Crispin stood frowning, then his brow cleared, as though he had put the matter from him.