Part 32 (1/2)
”My lord, I do now offer you in wordsat some brief date to pay you some of it in service,” replied dick, as he turned from the apartment
CHAPTER VI--ARBLASTER AGAIN
When dick and Lawless were suffered to steal, by a back way, out of the house where Lord Risingha had already coarden wall to consult on their best course The danger was extreht of them and raised the view-hallo, they would be run down and butchered instantly And not only was the town of Shoreby a mere net of peril for their lives, but to make for the open country was to run the risk of the patrols
A little way off, upon so; and hard by that, a very large granary with open doors
”Hoe lay there until the night fall?” dick proposed
And Lawless having no better suggestion to offer, they ranary at a run, and concealed theht rapidly departed; and presently thethe frozen sno or never was their opportunity to gain the Goat and Bagpipes unobserved and change their tell-tale garo round by the outskirts, and not run the gauntlet of the market-place, where, in the concourse of people, they stood the nised and slain
This course was a long one It took the dark and silent, and brought thein of the harbour Many of the shi+ps, as they could see by the clearby the calm sky, proceeded for more distant parts; answerably to this, the rude alehouses along the beach (although in defiance of the curfe, they still shone with fire and candle) were no longer thronged with custos
Hastily, half-running, with their h the deep snow and threaded the labyrinth of marine lumber; and they were already more than half way round the harbour when, as they were passing close before an alehouse, the door suddenly opened and let out a gush of light upon their fleeting figures
Instantly they stopped, and ed in earnest conversation
Three men, one after another, came out of the ale-house, and the last closed the door behind him All three were unsteady upon their feet, as if they had passed the day in deep potations, and they now stood wavering in the ht, like men who knew not what they would be after The tallest of the three was talking in a loud, laood Gascony as ever a tapster broached,” he was saying, ”the best shi+p out o' the port o' Dartold money--”
”I have bad losses, too,” interrupted one of the others ”I have had losses of ossip Arblaster I was robbed at Martins and a leather wallet orth ninepence farthing”
dick's heart smote hiht twice of the poor skipper who had been ruined by the loss of the Good Hope; so careless, in those days, were oods and interests of their inferiors But this sudden encounter re of his enterprise; and both he and Lawless turned their heads the other way, to avoid the chance of recognition
The shi+p's dog had, however, ain to Shoreby He was now at Arblaster's heels, and suddenly sniffing and pricking his ears, he darted forward and began to bark furiously at the two sham friars
His master unsteadily followed him
”Hey, shi+pmates!” he cried ”Have ye ever a penny pie for a poor old shi+pman, clean destroyed by pirates? I a; and now here I be, o' Saturday night, begging for a flagon of ale! Ask ood Gascon wine, a shi+p that was mine own, and was my father's before ilt, and thirteen pounds in gold and silver Hey! what say ye? A ht the French; I have cut h seas than ever a man that sails out of Dartmouth
Come, a penny piece”
Neither dick nor Lawless durst answer hinise their voices; and they stood there as helpless as a shi+p ashore, not knohere to turn nor what to hope
”Are ye dumb, boy?” inquired the skipper ”Mates,” he added, with a hiccup, ”they be dumb I like not this manner of discourtesy; for an a man be dumb, so be as he's courteous, he will still speak when he was spoken to, methinks”
By this tith, seemed to have conceived so soberer than his captain, stepped suddenly before hihly by the shoulder, and asked hiue To this the outlaw, thinking all was over,feint that stretched the sailor on the sand, and, calling upon dick to follow hi the lumber
The affair passed in a second Before dick could run at all, Arblaster had hiht him by one foot, and the thirdabove his head
It was not so er, it was not soShelton; it was the profound huham, and now fall helpless in the hands of this old, drunken sailor; and not merely helpless, but, as his conscience loudly told hiuilty--actually the bankrupt debtor of theme him back into the alehouse, till I see his face,” said Arblaster