"That is neither thine nor mine," replied Hardy, "so you had better let it alone."
"Heyday!" cried the servant of the great man's kinsman; "rated by a humpbacked ploughman! If it be not thine, fellow, hold thy tongue, for it can be nothing to thee! I shall take leave to make free with it, however," and, pouring out a cup, he tossed it off.
"You must be a poor rogue," said the peasant, "to be so fond of drinking at another man's cost, as not to pay for your liquor even by a civil word."
"What is that he says?" cried the man, turning to his companion--for, to say sooth, although he had heard every word, he was not quite prepared to act upon them, being one of those who are much more ready to bully and brawl, than to take part in a fray they have provoked--"what is that he says?"
"He called thee a poor rogue, Timothy," said his companion. "Turn him out by the heels, the misbegotten lump!"
"Out with him!" cried the other, seeing that his comrade was inclined to stand by him, "Out with him!" and he advanced, menacingly, upon the peasant.
"Hold your hands!--hold your hands!" said Hardy, shaking his head--"I am an old man, and not so well made as you two varlets, but I don't 'bide a blow from any poor kinsman's half-starved curs!--Take care, my men!" and as one of them approached rather too near, he struck him a blow, without rising from his stool, which made him measure his length upon the rushes that strewed the floor, crying out at the same time, in a whining tone, "To think of two huge fellows falling upon a poor, deformed old body."
It so happened that the personage whom the peasant had knocked down was the braver man of the two; and, starting up, he rushed fiercely upon his adversary; which his companion espying, darted upon Hardy at the same moment, and by a dexterous kick of his foot knocked the stool from under him, thus bringing the hunchback and his own comrade to the ground together. He then caught their enemy by the collar, and held his head firmly down upon the floor with both hands, as one has sometimes seen a child do with a refractory kitten.
"Baste him, Dickon--baste him!" he cried.
"I'll give him a dip in the horse-pond," said the other; "his nose will make the water fizz like a red-hot horseshoe."
At that moment, however, the noise occasioned by such boisterous proceedings called in pretty Kate Greenly, the landlord's daughter, who, although she had a great reverence and regard for all the serving men of Richard de Ashby, was not fond of seeing poor Hardy ill-treated. Glancing eagerly round, while the peasant strove with his two opponents, she seized a pail of water which stood behind the parlour door, and following the plan which she had seen her father pursue with the bulldog and mastiff which tenanted the back yard, she dashed the whole of the contents over the combatants as they lay struggling on the ground.
All three started up, panting; but the gain was certainly on the part of Hardy, who, freed from the grasp of his adversaries, caught up the three-legged stool on which he had been sitting, and whirling it lightly above his head, prepared to defend himself therewith against his assailants; who, on their part, with their rage heightened rather than assuaged by the cool libation which Kate had poured upon them, drew the short swords that they carried, and were rushing upon the old peasant with no very merciful intent.
Kate Greenly now screamed aloud, exerting her pretty little throat to the utmost, and her cries soon brought in the lord's man, followed, somewhat slowly, by Richard de Ashby. The good landlord himself--having established as a rule, both out of regard for his own person and for the custom of his house, never to interfere in any quarrels if he could possibly avoid it, which rule had produced, on certain occasions, great obtuseness in sight and in hearing--kept out of the way, and indeed removed himself to the stable upon the pretence of looking after his guests' horses.
The lord's man, however, with the true spirit of an English yeoman, dashed at once into the fray, taking instant part with the weakest.
"Come, come!" he cried, placing himself by Hardy's side, "two men against one--and he an old one! Out upon it! Stand off, or I'll break your jaws for you!"
This accession to the forces of their adversary staggered the two servants, and a momentary pause took place, in which their master's voice was at last heard.
"What! brawling, fools!" he exclaimed. "We have something else to think of now. Stand back, and let the old man go! Get you gone, ploughman; and don't let me find you snarling with a gentleman's servants again, or I will put you in the stocks for your pains."
"I will break his head before he's out of the house," said one of the men, who seemed to pay but little deference to his master's commands.
"I will break thine, if thou triest it," answered the lord's man, sturdily. "Come along, old man, come along; I will see thee safe out of the place, and let any one of them lay a finger on thee if he dare!"
Thus saying, he grasped Hardy's arm and led him forth from the inn, muttering as he did so, "By the shoulder-bone of St. Luke, the old fellow has got limbs enough to defend himself!--It's as thick as a roll of brawn, and as hard as a branch of oak! How goes it with thee, fellow?"
"Stiff--woundy stiff, sir," replied the hunchback; "but I thank you, with all my heart, for taking part with me; and I would fain give you a cup of good ale in return, such as you have never tasted out of London. If you could but contrive to come to my poor place to-morrow morning," he added, dropping his voice to a low tone, "I could shew some country sports, which, as you are a judge of such things, might please you."
"It must be early hours, then," replied the serving-man. "Those that don't come to-night will not be here till noon to-morrow, it is true: but still I think I had better wait for them."
"Nay, nay--come," said Hardy; "come and take a cup of ale with me," and, after a pause, he added, significantly, "besides, there's something I want to tell you which may profit your lord."
"But how shall I find my way?" demanded the serving-man, gazing inquiringly in his face, but with no expression of surprise at the intimation he received.
"Oh, I will shew you," answered the peasant. "Meet me at the church stile there, and I will guide you. It is not far. Be there a little before six, and you shall find me waiting. Give me your hand on't."
The serving-man held out his hand, and Hardy shook it in a grasp such as might be given by a set of iron pincers, at the same time advancing his head, and adding, in a low tone,
"Take care what you do--you have a traitor there! One of those men is a nidget, and the other is a false hound, come down to spy upon good men and true."
Thus saying, he relaxed his hold, and, turning away, was soon lost in the obscure twilight of the evening.
CHAPTER III.
The animal called the sluggard has greatly increased in modern days. In former times the specimens were few and far between. The rising of the sun was generally the signal for knight and yeoman to quit their beds, and if some of the old or the soft cumbered their pillows for an hour or so later, the sleeping time rarely if ever extended beyond seven in the morning.
The sky was still grey when the stout yeoman, whom we have mentioned under the title of the lord's man, but whose real name was Thomas Blawket, sprang lightly out of his bed, and made that sort of rapid, but not unwholesome toilet, which a hardy Englishman, in his rank of life, was then accustomed to use. It consisted merely in one or two large buckets of clean cold water poured over his round curly head and naked shoulders, and then, with but some small ceremony of drying, his clothes were cast on, and bound round him with his belt. The whole operation occupied, perhaps, ten minutes, and a considerable portion of that space of time was taken up in rubbing dry his thick, close, short-cut beard, which curled up under the process into little knots, like the coat of a French water dog.
"Give thee good day, host, give thee good day," he said, as he issued forth. "I will be back anon;" and, sauntering forward leisurely on the green, he