th me; so I rode, as if
discontented, into the yard of the _Mitre_, and demanded of an ostler
whether there was any food fit to eat there.

He looked at me in a kind of hesitation.

"Yes, sir," he said; "but--but the parlour is full. A party is there,
from London."

Then I knew that I had been right to come; because at the same moment I
remembered where I had seen those liveries before. They were those worn
by the men who had come with Monmouth to Hare Street.

I said nothing to the ostler; but slipped off my horse, as he took the
bridle, and went indoors. The fellow called out after me; but I made as
if I did not hear. (I have found, more than once, that a little deafness
is a very good thing.) There were voices I heard talking beyond a door
at the end of the passage; I went up to this, and without knocking,
lifted the latch and went in.

The room, that looked out, with one window only, into a small enclosed
garden, was full of men. There were eight of them, as I counted
presently; all round a table on which stood a couple of tall jugs and
tankards. I raised my hand to my hat.

"I beg pardon, gentlemen. Is there room--"

"Why--it is Mr.--" I heard a voice say, suddenly stifled.

Beyond that, for a moment, there was silence. Then a man stood up
suddenly, with a kind of eagerness.

"Mr. Mallock," he said, "Mr. Mallock! Do you not remember me?"

"Your back is to the light, sir--" I began; and then: "Why it is Mr.
Rumbald."

"The same, sir; the same. There is a friend of yours, here, sir--Come in
and sit down, sir. There is plenty of room for another friend."

There was a very curious kind of eagerness in the maltster's voice,
which puzzled me not a little; and there was a change of manner too in
him, that puzzled me no less. He spoke as if he had almost expected me,
or was peculiarly astonished to see me there; and there was none of that
hail-fellow air about him any more. He spoke to me as to a gentleman--as
indeed I shewed I was by my dress--but yet manifested no surprise at
seeing me so. However, I had neither time nor thought to consider this
at the moment, for the friend of mine of whom he spoke, and who was now
standing up to greet me, was no other than my Lord Essex--he who had
been riding with Monmouth from Newmarket; and he whose name Mr.
Chiffinch had expressly spoken of to me. Yet how did Mr. Rumbald know
that we knew one another?

I made haste to salute him; for he too, I thought, had an air of