"Oh! that wasn't ours," said the woman, taken off her guard by the coolness of Josiah,—"that belonged to a young gentleman that——"
"Hold your jaw and bar the door, and be d——d to you!" exclaimed a man, coming out of the house in a rage.
"This looks suspicious and businesslike," said Lieut. Fowler, as he rushed into the garden after Josiah, followed by their two companions. The woman had disappeared at the first rush, but they were met midway between the door of the house and the outer door of the garden, by a rough, strong-built man, who seemed half sailor and half miner by his dress.
"What the devil do you want here?" said he, addressing Lieut. Fowler, who was now the foremost of the party. "I'm d——d if I don't see light through you in about two twos." And he drew a pistol from a side-pocket, and presented it at the lieutenant's breast.
"Two can play at that game," exclaimed Fowler, drawing a pistol from his breast-pocket.
"And three!" cried Mr. Morley, drawing his pistol also.
"Now, I'll tell 'ee, soas," said Capt. Trenow, putting his cudgel very coolly between the parties, and addressing the stranger on whom they had intruded,—"'tes like as this here, you knaw; two to one es brave odds,—the one might be killed—sure to be, I s'pose. Ef you've got any more of your sort inside, comrade, bring them out and then we'll fight fe-ar; or, ef you haan't got no backers for to fight, why lev es have a croom o' chat. Now, I've done, soas; spaik the next who will. As for fighten, I can stand a bra' tussle; but as for spaiken, I arn't wuth much."
No backers—as Capt. Trenow called them—came out; and, as the occupant of the house sew that he was left so sadly in the minority, and felt, no doubt, that he had been the first aggressor, by presenting his pistol at the breast of a king's officer, as he knew Lieut. Fowler to be by his dress, he began to make apologies as best he could, very much to the amusement of Capt. Trenow, who really seemed to be the coolest of the party, and, like a good and experienced general, was equal to the occasion, and could by his coolness and shrewd common sense, persuade where he could not command. And he very soon led the way into the house, as if he had been the owner of it, and was followed by all the party.
As resistance was quite out of the question, against four armed men, and one of them a king's officer in authority, Capt. Cooper made a virtue of necessity, and became very civil and obsequious.