“Run round to the back,” says I, “and get yourself a noggin, and if so be you see a gentleman on horseback there asleep, why, ’tis only a friend of mine that is weary of his long journey. I will call you if there be occasion.”
He hesitated a moment, but I set a crown on his palm, and his scruples vanished. He limped into the darkness.
’Twas no more than two minutes later that I heard voices in the doorway, and next came Timothy Grubbe into the night, in talk with someone. At which it took me but thirty seconds to whip me into the seat and pull the coachman’s cloak about me, so that I sat stark and black in the starlight. Grubbe left the man he talked with and came forward.
“You shall drink when ye reach Cobham, Crossway,” says he, looking up at me, “and mind your ways, damn ye!”
And at that he made no more ado, but humming an air he lurched into the carriage. I pulled out the nags, and turned their heads so that they were set for the north. And then I whistled low and short—a whistle I knew that the mare would heed, and I trusted that she would bring her companion with her. The wheels rolled out upon the road and Timothy Grubbe and I were bound for London all alone.
As I turned up the London road that swept steeply up the downs I looked back, and behind the moon shone faintly on Calypso and behind her on the dead man wagging awkwardly in his stirrups.
I pushed the horses on as fast as might be, but the ruts were still deep in mud, and the carriage jolted and rocked and swayed as we went. The wind came now with a little moaning sound from the bottom of the valley, and the naked branches creaked above my head, for that way was sunken and tangled with the thickets of nut and yew. And presently I was forced to go at a foot pace, so abrupt was the height. The moon struck through the trees and peered on us, and Grubbe put his head forth of the window.
“Why go you not faster, damn ye?” says he, being much in liquor.
“’Tis the hill, your honor,” said I.
He glanced up and down.