time
of day, and for that purpose had puckered my features with a smile--"

"Like those of a jackanape simpering at a chestnut," said Michael
Lambourne.

"Up started of a sudden," continued Goldthred, without heeding the
interruption, "Tony Foster himself, with a cudgel in his hand--"

"And broke thy head across, I hope, for thine impertinence," said his
entertainer.

"That were more easily said than done," answered Goldthred indignantly;
"no, no--there was no breaking of heads. It's true, he advanced his
cudgel, and spoke of laying on, and asked why I did not keep the
public road, and such like; and I would have knocked him over the pate
handsomely for his pains, only for the lady's presence, who might have
swooned, for what I know."

"Now, out upon thee for a faint-spirited slave!" said Lambourne; "what
adventurous knight ever thought of the lady's terror, when he went
to thwack giant, dragon, or magician, in her presence, and for her
deliverance? But why talk to thee of dragons, who would be driven back
by a dragon-fly. There thou hast missed the rarest opportunity!"

"Take it thyself, then, bully Mike," answered Goldthred. "Yonder is the
enchanted manor, and the dragon, and the lady, all at thy service, if
thou darest venture on them."

"Why, so I would for a quartern of sack," said the soldier--"or stay: I
am foully out of linen--wilt thou bet a piece of Hollands against these
five angels, that I go not up to the Hall to-morrow and force Tony
Foster to introduce me to his fair guest?"

"I accept your wager," said the mercer; "and I think, though thou hadst
even the impudence of the devil, I shall gain on thee this bout. Our
landlord here shall hold stakes, and I will stake down gold till I send
the linen."

"I will hold stakes on no such matter," said Gosling. "Good now, my
kinsman, drink your wine in quiet, and let such ventures alone. I
promise you, Master Foster hath interest enough to lay you up in
lavender in the Castle at Oxford, or to get your legs made acquainted
with the town-stocks."

"That would be but renewing an old intimacy, for Mike's shins and the
town's wooden pinfold have been well known to each other ere now," said
the mercer; "but he shall not budge from his wager, unless he means to
pay forfeit."

"Forfeit?" said Lambourne; "I scorn it. I value Tony Foster's wrath no
more than a shelled pea-cod; and I will visit his Lindabrides, by Saint
George, be he willing or no!"

"I would