“This will not do for me,” said the beggar, coming down again. “I’ll take to the storm first. What is this chamber leading out from the tap-room?”
“That is my own,” replied the landlord, with some return of his old incivility, “and I’ll give it up to no beggar.”
The king without answering opened the door of the chamber and found himself in a room that could be barricaded. Taking a light with him he examined it more minutely.
“Is this matchlock loaded?” he asked, pointing to a clumsy gun, which had doubtless caused the death of more than one deer in the forest.
The landlord answered in surly fashion that it was, but the king tested the point for himself.
“Now,” he said, “I rest here, and you will see that I am not disturbed. Any man who attempts to enter this room gets the contents of this gun in him, and I’ll trust to my two daggers to take care of the rest.”
He had no dagger with him, but he spoke for the benefit of the company in the tap-room. Something in his resolute manner seemed to impress the landlord, who grumbled, muttering half to himself and half to his companions, but he nevertheless retired, leaving the king alone, whereupon James fortified the door, and afterward slept unmolested the sleep of a tired man, until broad day woke him.
Wonderful is the change wrought in a man’s feelings by a fair morning. A new day; a new lease of life. The recurrent morning must have been contrived to give discouraged humanity a fresh chance. The king, amazed to find that he had slept so soundly in spite of the weight of apprehension on his mind the night before, discovered this apprehension to be groundless in the clear light of the new day. The sulky villains of the tap-room were now honest fellows who would harm no one, and James laughed aloud at his needless fears; the loaded matchlock in the corner giving no hint of its influence towards a peaceful night. The landlord seemed, indeed, a most civil person, who would be the last to turn a penniless man from his door. James, over his breakfast, asked what had become of the company, and his host replied that they were woodlanders; good lads in their way, but abashed before strangers. Some of them had gone to their affairs in the forest and others had proceeded to St. Ninians, to enjoy the hanging set for that day.
“And which way may your honour be journeying?” asked the innkeeper, “for I see that you are no beggar.”
“I am no beggar at such an inhospitable house as this,” replied the wayfarer, “but elsewhere I am a beggar, that is to say, the gold I come by is asked for, and not earned.”