or 'tother.
All I sez is--I won't have it. But what I will have is--I'll be
paid for that there tankard. Who threw it?"

"It was he--yonder, in tatters," said the boy.

"You won't get money out o' me," said Marshall; "my pockets--you may
turn 'em out and see for yourself--are rich in nothing but holes,
and there's in them just about as many of they as there are in the
rose o' a watering can."

"I shall be paid," asserted the hostess. "You three are mates, and
there'll be money enough among you."

"Look here, mistress," put in the sailor, "I'll stand the damage,
only don't let us have a row. Bring me another can of ale, and tell
me what it all comes to. Then we'll be on the move."

"The other fellows may clear off, and the sooner the better," said
the landlady. "But not you just now, and the baby has dropped off
into the sweetest of sleeps. 'Twere a sin to wake her."

"I'm going on to the Huts," said the seaman.

"And we're going with him as a guard to the baby," said the Irish
fellow.

"A blackguard set," threw in Bideabout.

"What about the color so long as it is effective?" asked Casey.

By degrees the anger of Lonegon was allayed, and he seated himself
growling at the table, and wiped the blood from his torn wrist on
his sleeve, and drawing forth a dirty and tattered red kerchief,
bound it round the bruised and wounded joint. The man, Bideabout,
did not concern himself with the wrath or the anguish of the man.
He rubbed his hands together, and clapped a palm on each knee, and
looked into the fire with a smirk on his face, but with an eye on
the alert lest his adversary should attempt to steal an advantage
on him.

Nor was he unjustified in being on his guard, judging by the
malignant glances cast at him by Lonegon.

"Whom may you be?" asked the tattered man.

"I'm Jonas Kink," answered the young fellow at the fire.

"He's Bideabout, the Broom-Squire," explained the landlady. Then
with a glimmering of a notion that this variation in names might
prove confusing, she added, "leastways that's what we calls him.
We don't use the names writ in the Church register here. He's the
Broom-Squire--and not the sort o' chap for you ragamuffins to
have dealings with--let me tell you."

"I don't kear what he be," said Lonegon, sullenly, "but dang it,
I'd like a sup o' ale with your leave," and without further
ceremony he took the new tankard from the sailor and quaffed off
half its contents.

The hostess look