he plague strike me if I don't stick
to his elbow!' He raised his hand excitedly as he spoke, and instantly
losing his balance, he shot into a dense clump of bushes by the roadside
whence his legs flapped helplessly in the darkness.

'That makes the tenth,' said he, scrambling out and clambering into
his saddle once more. 'My father used to tell me not to sit a horse too
closely. "A gentle rise and fall," said the old man. Egad, there is more
fall than rise, and it is anything but gentle.'

'Odd's truth!' exclaimed Saxon. 'How in the name of all the saints in
the calendar do you expect to keep your seat in the presence of an enemy
if you lose it on a peaceful high-road?'

'I can but try, my illustrious,' he answered, rearranging his ruffled
clothing. 'Perchance the sudden and unexpected character of my movements
may disconcert the said enemy.'

'Well, well, there may be more truth in that than you are aware of,'
quoth Saxon, riding upon Lockarby's bridle arm, so that there was scarce
room for him to fall between us. 'I had sooner fight a man like that
young fool at the inn, who knew a little of the use of his weapon, than
one like Micah here, or yourself, who know nothing. You can tell what
the one is after, but the other will invent a system of his own which
will serve his turn for the nonce. Ober-hauptmann Muller was reckoned to
be the finest player at the small-sword in the Kaiser's army, and could
for a wager snick any button from an opponent's vest without cutting the
cloth. Yet was he slain in an encounter with Fahnfuhrer Zollner, who was
a cornet in our own Pandour corps, and who knew as much of the rapier as
you do of horsemanship. For the rapier, be it understood, is designed
to thrust and not to cut, so that no man wielding it ever thinks of
guarding a side-stroke. But Zollner, being a long-armed man, smote his
antagonist across the face with his weapon as though it had been a
cane, and then, ere he had time to recover himself, fairly pinked him.
Doubtless if the matter were to do again, the Oberhauptmann would have
got his thrust in sooner, but as it was, no explanation or excuse could
get over the fact that the man was dead.'

'If want of knowledge maketh a dangerous swordsman,' quoth Reuben, 'then
am I even more deadly than the unpronounceable gentleman whom you have
mentioned. To continue my story, however, which I broke off in order to
step down from my horse, I found out early in the morning that ye