"Well,—" She paused a moment, trembling on the brink; then said, a little unsteadily: "I will be at the gate at nightfall."
A coach was lumbering along at the farther half of the street. A large lady therein, masked, blonde-haired, called out toward the other side of the cross:
"How now, Captain Ravenshaw? Hast spent all that money? Art waiting for a purse to cut?"
Millicent gave Holyday a startled look, and exclaimed:
"She said Captain Ravenshaw!—the rogue that cozened you. He must be yonder."
"Impossible!" gasped the scholar, turning pale.
"It must be he. She is laughing at him. What, are you afraid?—you that would make him pay for the lesson!"
In desperation, the fate-hounded poet grasped his sword-hilt, and strode to the other side of the cross, coming face to face with the captain.
"I'm not to blame," said the terrified scholar, in an undertone. "She heard your name; I had to seek you—"