"A piece of good luck, sir," began Captain Ravenshaw, to the released prisoner, around whom the gallants assembled while they compared knocks and trophies. "You had been scurvily lodged this night, else."
"Sirs, I thank ye," replied the old gentleman, finding at last his voice, though it was the mildest of voices at best. He was still shaky from having been so recently in great fright; but he gathered force as his gratitude grew with his clearer sense of escape.
"God wot, I am much beholden to ye. You know not what you have saved me from."
"To say truth, a lousy hole behind an iron grating were no pleasant place for one of your quality," said Ravenshaw.
"Oh, 'tis not that so much, though 'twere bad enough," said the gentleman, with a shudder. "'Tis the lifetime of blame that would have followed when my wife had heard of it. You must know, sirs, I am a country gentleman, and I am not known to be in London; my detention would be noised about, and when it reached my wife's ears—'sfoot, sirs, I am for ever your debtor in thankfulness!" And he looked his meaning most fervently.
"Why did the watch take you up?" inquired the captain.
"Why, for nothing but being abroad in the streets. The plaguey rascals said I was a night-walker, and that I behaved suspiciously. I did nothing but stand and wait at the Standard yonder, for one I had agreed to meet; but when I saw the watch coming I stepped back, to be out of their lantern-light. This stepping back, they said, proved I was a rogue; and so they clapped hands on me, and fetched me along. But now I bethink me, sirs: the person I was to meet—what will she do an she find me not at the place?" The old gentleman showed a reawakened distress, and, turning toward the direction whence the watch had brought him, looked wistfully and yet reluctantly into the darkness.
"Oho! She!" quoth the captain. "No wonder your wife—"
"Nay, think no harm, I beg. Nay, nay, good sirs! Sure, 'tis an evil-thinking world. Well, I must e'en bid ye good night, and leave ye my best thanks. Would I might some day repay you this courtesy. My name, sirs—but no, an ye'll pardon me, I durst not; the very stones might hear it, and report I was in London. But if I might know—"
"Surely. We have no wives in the country, that we must keep our doings from, have we, boys? And we are free of the streets of London, aren't we, boys? My name, sir, is Ravenshaw—Captain Ravenshaw; and this gentleman—"