When they reached the turnpike-road she turned to the right, and he soon perceived that they were following the direction of the excisemen and their load. He had given her his arm, and every now and then she suddenly pulled it back, to signify that he was to halt a moment and listen. They had walked rather quickly along the first quarter of a mile, and on the second or third time of standing still she said, ‘I hear them ahead—don’t you?’
‘Yes,’ he said; ‘I hear the wheels. But what of that?’
‘I only want to know if they get clear away from the neighbourhood.’
‘Ah,’ said he, a light breaking upon him. ‘Something desperate is to be attempted!—and now I remember there was not a man about the village when we left.’
‘Hark!’ she murmured. The noise of the cartwheels had stopped, and given place to another sort of sound.
‘’Tis a scuffle!’ said Stockdale. ‘There’ll be murder! Lizzy, let go my arm; I am going on. On my conscience, I must not stay here and do nothing!’
‘There’ll be no murder, and not even a broken head,’ she said. ‘Our men are thirty to four of them: no harm will be done at all.’
‘Then there is an attack!’ exclaimed Stockdale; ‘and you knew it was to be. Why should you side with men who break the laws like this?’
‘Why should you side with men who take from country traders what they have honestly bought wi’ their own money in France?’ said she firmly.
‘They are not honestly bought,’ said he.