In the clearing which he had just passed sat Gyll Croyden looking up at Roger Prat, who stood before her in an attitude of indecision and unaccustomed solemnity, while the bear regarded them drowsily from the overhanging branches of a tree. What transpired between the man and woman Marlowe could not definitely surmise, yet the result of their conversation was to subvert completely his own future.
“Now, I tell you,” said Prat, after the sound of footsteps had died away, “I am a peculiar personage.” He sank his chin deep into its triple substructure surveyed her with perplexity. In his hand he held an Indian pipe, whose wreaths of smoke rose and cast a veil before his face, through which his troubled, protruding eyes looked out with ghostly light.
“A peculiar hobgoblin,” corrected Gyll, laughing more from nervousness than mirth—“a dear hobgoblin.”
He eyed her reproachfully. “Oh, you may deride me with unflattering names,” he said, “but it makes no difference. Mark you, until now there has been one thing only which could make Roger Prat turn on his heel and run for dear life. This was the sight of a petticoat; but, alack! I am changed, most miserably changed, and, by some perversity, my new courage seems cowardice as well. For I take it that a really brave man nerves himself to retreat before the bombardment of a wench’s eyes. ’Tis the coward who succumbs.”
Gyll pouted. “Run away, then, and prove yourself a soldier.” But he shook his head with ponderous gravity, and, curiously enough, the unprecedented soberness of his manner spread to her. “Oh, you would stay. Now, I am glad of that, Sir Goblin,” and, rising, she stood facing him, with a hand on each of his bulky shoulders. “I am glad, Roger,” she repeated, in a softer tone. “For dost know that, with all my gallants, with the memory of all those faces upturned and kisses thrown to my window on the Bankside, ’tis a common fighting man I would marry?—a great, cumbersome roly-poly, a mountain, a heathen image, call him what you will, yet to me he hath so light a heart, so quaint a way, so sturdy a courage, that methinks he hath already won me.”
At this, either a recollection of her long-lost girlhood or a play of mere wanton coquetry—she herself did not know which—caused her to cast down her eyes, while the flush of her cheeks deepened vividly. For an instant Prat seemed to sway, as though his legs with an effort supported his corpulent body, and the perplexity of his look increased. Instinctively he thrust the pipe-stem between his teeth, and, gazing up at King Lud, blew a cloud of smoke into the branches. The bear looked down through it, blinking and sniffing at his master, while for a moment Roger himself was almost completely enveloped.
“Thou imp of Uppowac,” quoth Gyll, stepping back with a grimace, “is this thy only response to my condescension?” and she made as though to start away into the forest. But Roger, suddenly all-forgetful of his dilemma, waddled after her.
“Nay, stay,” he called, apprehensively; “stay, and permit me to collect my scattered wits.”
She turned and laughed with scornful badinage. “Stay?” she echoed; “and wherefore, pray? Merely that you may blow tobacco fumes into my eyes and blind them to the charm of your countenance?”
“Oh no,” he remonstrated. “In troth, I blew the smoke to hide the face of his wondering majesty above. His red eyes and sniffing snout seemed to condemn and scorn me. There, I’ll smoke no more,” and, knocking out the pipe’s ashes, he restored it quickly to his belt.