ick turned from the glare of the open door,
and looked out into the moonlight. It seemed quite dark at first. The
master-player's face was bitter white, and his fingers were tapping a
queer staccato upon the table-top.

"A plague on the bedlam dice!" said he. "I think they are bewitched."

"Huff, ruff, and snuff!" the other replied. "Don't get the
mubble-fubbles, Carew: there's nought the matter with the dice."

A man came down from the tap-room door. Nick stepped aside to let him
pass. He was a player, by his air.

He wore a riding-cloak of Holland cloth, neither so good nor so bad as a
riding-cloak might be, but under it a handsome jerkin overlaid with
lace, and belted with a buff girdle in which was a light Spanish rapier.
His boots were russet cordovan, mid-thigh tall, and the rowels of his
clinking spurs were silver stars. He was large of frame, and his curly
hair was short and brown; so was his pointed beard. His eyes were
singularly bright and fearless, and bluff self-satisfaction marked his
stride; but his under lip was petulant, and he flicked his boot with his
riding-whip as he shouldered his way along.

"Ye cannot miss the place, sir," called the tapster after him. "'Tis
just beyond Ned Alleyn's, by the ditch. Ye'll never mistake the ditch,
sir--Billingsgate is roses to it."

"Oh, I'll find it fast enough," the stranger answered; "but he should
have sent to meet me, knowing I might come at any hour. 'Tis a felon
place for thieves; and I've not heart to skewer even a goose on such a
night as this."

At the sudden breaking of voices upon the silence, Carew looked up, with
a quarrel ripe for picking in his eye. But seeing who spoke, such a
smile came rippling from the corners of his mouth across his dark,
unhappy face that it was as if a lamp of welcome had been lighted there.
"What, Ben!" he cried; "thou here? Why, bless thine heart, old gossip,
'tis good to see an honest face amid this pack of rogues."

There was a surly muttering in the crowd. Carew threw his head back
haughtily and set his knuckles to his hip. "A pack of rogues, I say," he
repeated sharply; "and a fig for the whole pack!" There was a certain
wildness in his eyes. No one stirred or made reply.

"Good! Gaston," laughed the stranger, with a shrug; "picking thy company
still, I see, for quantity, and not for quality. No, thank 'e; none of
the tap for me. My Lord Hunsdon was made chamberlain in his father's
stead to-day, and I'm off hot