d be damned!" roared the fellow. "Ha--look alive, Jem!" And
whirling up his staff, he made at me amain; but I sprang aside and, as
his rush carried him past, my answering stroke caught him fairly 'twixt
wrist and elbow and his cudgel spun harmlessly into the hedge;
breathing curses he sought to close with me, but I, keeping my
distance, smote him (very blithely) how and where I would until he (his
arm useless), misliking my bludgeon-play and reading no mercy in my
look, very wisely betook him to his heels. Hereupon I turned to find
the little peddler sitting astride his man's neck and his fist against
the fellow's nose:

"Smell it, Job!" he was saying. "Smell it, lad, 'tis the fist of a man
as would be a-groping for your liver if it weren't for the respect I do
bear your old mother--skin me else! So thank your old mother, lad,
first as you've got a liver and second for a-saving o' that same liver.
And now, get up, Job--begone, Job, arter your pal, and tell folk as
kind Godby, though sore tempted, never so much as set finger on your
liver, and all along o' your good old mother--away wi' ye!" So the
fellow got him to his legs (mighty rueful) and sped away after his
comrade.

"Pal," says the little peddler, reaching out and grasping my hand,
"here's full quittance for that pannikin o' water as you never got!
And now--what's the word?"

"Now," says I, "let us go back and drink the good ale!"

"Pal," quoth the peddler, with a flash of white teeth, "wi' all my
heart!"

Thus we presently returned to the little tavern and found there Roger
the landlord, the rusty sword in one brawny fist, his wife holding fast
to the other. At sight of us he dropped the weapon and roared
joyously, and Cicely, running to us, clasped our hands in hearty
welcome. So we sat down all four, and while we quaffed the ale Godby
described our late encounter with great exactness.

"Pal," says he thereafter, reaching across the table to grip my hand
again, "what might your name be?"

"Martin."

"Why then, Martin, have ye any friends or kin?"

"None!"

"No more have I, and look now, this Kent country is no fit place for
you or me arter to-day! So what I says is, lets you and me pad it,
pal--the road, lad--the good high-road, aha! How say ye, Martin?"

"No!"

"Why no, pal?"

"Because, after to-night, if I chance to be neither dead nor in prison,
I'm for shipboard."

"'Tis an ill life, pal!"

"Why, life is an ill thing!" says I.