. This was lucky for poor Lee.
'Well, never mind if it _was_ me, old brick,' rejoined the fellow; 'or
at least you have been a brick, though I'm misdoubting you'll die a
pantile after all. But here's luck; all's one for that.' He held a
pewter-pot in one hand, and a pipe in the other, and as he drank, his
somewhat confused but baleful look continued levelled savagely along
the pewter at the terrified doctor. There was, I saw, mischief in the
man.

'I'd drink yours,' continued the reckless scamp, as he paused for
breath, drew the back of his pipe-hand across his mouth, and stared as
steadily as he could in my face--'I'd drink your health, if I only
knew your name.'

'You'll hear it plainly enough, my fine fellow, when you're in the
dock one of these days, just before the judge sends you to the hulks,
or, which is perhaps the likelier, to the gallows. And this scamp,
too,' I added, with a gesture towards Lee, whom I hardly dared venture
to look at, 'who has been pitching me such a pretty rigmarole, is, I
see, a fellow-rogue to yourself. This house appears to be little
better than a thieves' rendezvous, upon my word.'

'Wyatt regarded me with a deadly scowl as he answered: 'Ay, ay, you're
a brave cock, Master Warneford, upon your own dunghill. It may be my
turn some day. Here, doctor, a word with you outside.' They both left
the room, and I rang the bell, discharged the score, and was just
going when Lee returned. He was still pale and shaky, though
considerably recovered from the panic-terror excited by the sudden
entrance of Wyatt.

'Thank Heaven, he's gone!' said the doctor; 'and less sour and
suspicious than I feared him to be. But tell me, sir, do you intend
walking from here to Hythe?'

'I so purpose. Why do you ask?'

'Because the young girl you saw in the bar went off ten minutes ago by
the same road. She was too late for a farmer's cart which she expected
to return by. Wyatt, too, is off in the same direction.'

'She will have company then.'

'Evil company, I fear. Her father and he have lately quarrelled; and
her, I know, he bears a grudge against, for refusing, as the talk
goes, to have anything to say to him.'

'Very well; don't alarm yourself. I shall soon overtake them, and you
may depend the big drunken bully shall neither insult nor molest her.
Good-night.'

It was a lonely walk for a girl to take on a winter evening, although
the weather was brilliantly light and clear, and it was not yet muc