Parties of the royalist army were moving in every direction round Hull, and from time to time saker and falconet, and such other artillery as the garrison had been able to muster on the walls, were discharged at the adventurous Cavaliers who approached too near, when Mr. Dry, of Longsoaken, having been permitted by the guard who had him in charge to gather his baggage hastily together at the "Swan," and to saddle his horse, issued forth from the gates, leaving behind him, in the hands of Mrs. White, in part payment of his bill, the horse on which Arrah Neil had ridden thither. Not that Mr. Dry had come unprovided with the needful means of meeting any expenses he might incur; far from it, for he was a wealthy man, and for many years had never known what even temporary want was; but he loved barter, and generally gained by; and though he was indeed obliged to dispose of the nag to the good landlady at a loss, yet this loss, as he contrived it, was less than would have been incurred by any other process.

However, when he stood without the gates and saw them closed behind him; when he beheld, wherever he turned, some body of horse or foot at the distance of less than a mile: and, more than all, when he heard a cannon boom over his head from above, the heart of Mr. Dry, of Longsoaken, sank, and he felt a degree of trepidation he had never known in life before. What to do he could not tell; but after much deliberation he resolved to stay where he was till the royalist troops were withdrawn, calculating justly that they would not approach so near as to do him any harm, and that the troops within would not issue forth while the others were in sight.

One point, indeed, he did not foresee. The Earl of Beverley and Colonel Ashburnham had passed out while he was at the inn, but the redoubtable Captain Barecolt was still behind; and, as the evil fate of Mr. Dry would have it, just after he had remained under shelter of the archway to one hour and a quarter by the great clock, holding his horse by the bridle all the time, the gate behind him suddenly began to clank and rattle in the painful operation of giving exit to that great hero.

Mr. Dry started up and looked behind him, lifting his foot towards the stirrup at the same moment; and as soon as he beheld Captain Barecolt, he scrambled into the saddle as well as he could; but, alas! that renowned officer was already mounted, and Mr. Dry had to perform an operation which was difficult to him. He had got his left foot in the stirrup; he had swung himself up into the saddle; but before his right foot could find its place of repose (and Mr. Dry did not venture to spur on till it had), the gates were closed behind Captain Barecolt, and he himself was by the Puritan's side.

"Ha, ha! old drybones!" said that officer, "have I caught thee at length?"

"What want you with me, man of Belial?" demanded the master of Longsoaken, with the cat-in-a-corner courage of despair. "Get you gone upon your way, and let better men than yourself follow theirs."

"Nay, good faith!" answered Barecolt, stretching out his left hand and grasping Mr. Dry's rein: "I always love that better men than myself should bear me company, and such is to be thy fate, O Dry! so do not think to escape it; for, as sure as my name is de Capitaine Jersval, if you attempt any one of all those running tricks which you know so well how to practice, I will slit your weasand incontinent. It matters not two straws to me whether I have you alive or dead, but have your corpus I will, as the prisoner of my bow and spear, as you would call it. Come, use your spurs, or I must spur your beast for you. You see that party of honest Cavaliers there on the hill--terrible malignants, every one of them, that would have a pleasure in roasting you by a slow fire, like a tough old goose, and basting you with those strong waters that you love so well. To them we are going, so spur on with the alacrity which your good luck deserves. What! you will not? Oh, then, I must make you!" and drawing his sword, he pricked Mr. Dry's horse so close to that worthy gentleman's thigh, that he started and rose in the stirrups.

The poor beast darted on in an instant, and in so doing shook Mr. Dry a good deal; but whether the concussion elicited a brilliant thought from his brain or not, he exclaimed immediately after--

"Harkye, Captain Barecolt! I have a word for ye. Do not let us ride so fast. I have an offer to make. Listen a moment."

Mr. Dry understood the peculiar genus of captain to which Barecolt belonged, but he did not understand the exact variety. He knew that, with most adventurous soldiers like himself, the food for which they hungered was gold. Drink might do much, dice might do much, fair ladies might do more; but gold, gold was paramount--an attraction not to be resisted. Mr. Dry loved gold, too, and overvalued its importance; but he felt a strong internal conviction that, if carried at once to the quarters of Lord Walton, life, which was the grand means of getting and enjoying gold, would be of a very short duration. He saw a noose dangling from a cross-tree before his eyes, and he wisely calculated that it would be better to sacrifice some portion of the less valuable commodity to save the more valuable; and therefore he prepared to tempt his companion's cupidity--not without a faint hope of cheating him after all, but with the resolution of giving anything that might save his life.

A sudden thought, too, had struck Captain Barecolt, which he proceeded to follow out, as will be seen presently; but its first effect was to make him draw in his rein, and also check the horse of Mr. Dry, over which he exercised supreme command; and as he did so, he said in a dry and bantering tone--

"Well, worshipful Mr. Dry, speak what you have to speak. As you will not have leisure to use your tongue much more on earth, it would be hard to deny you a few words. You are going to the gallows, Mr. Dry--you are going to the gallows; and though I cannot promise that you shall swing as high as Haman, yet you shall have as decent an execution as time and circumstances permit, and plenty of room for your feet.

"Nay," said Dry, with a sort of sobbing sigh, "you would not be so barbarous, so unchristian, especially when I am willing to pay ransom. Listen, captain--listen, noble Captain Barecolt: if you will not take me and put me into the hands of yonder men of Belial, I will--I will go as far as a hundred pounds."

"Men of Belial, sirrah!" cried Barecolt, turning upon him fiercely. "How dare you call his majesty's forces men of Belial. Those very words shall cost you five hundred pounds, if you would save your life."

Though the captain's words were fierce, yet they served to show that he was not quite inaccessible, and Mr. Dry began at once to higgle about his ransom; but Barecolt showed himself as hard a bargainer as he was himself; and as he perceived that every step they took in advance increased the trepidation of the worthy man of Longsoaken, he used the screw thus afforded him to squeeze Mr. Dry very painfully. Now he pushed on his horse--now he slackened his pace--now he pointed out a party of Cavaliers approaching very near; and, discovering exactly what Mr. Dry had upon his person, he took care to make his demand much more, in order that he might have the opportunity of keeping him in his hands till the sum was paid, which was indeed the principal object he had in view.

Some difficulties, totally independent of Mr. Dry's natural reluctance to part with his money, even to save his life, occurred in the course of the negotiation. Barecolt was well aware, from what he had seen of the king's conduct, that if the prisoner were taken to the camp, instead of mounting a ladder, he would more likely regain his liberty very speedily; and the worthy Puritan, on the contrary, was terrified at the very thought of approaching the royal quarters, his consciousness of offences grave and manifold presenting instant death to his imagination as the only result. What then was to be done with him while he remained in the custody of Captain Barecolt? That valiant gentleman proposed that he should assume a false name, and pass as a friend of his in the camp; but Mr. Dry, remembering that he was known to many in Lord Walton's troop, rejected this idea as totally inconsistent with his own safety.

"You might as well hang me at once," he said.

"That might be pleasant enough," answered Barecolt, "were it not that you have only a hundred and fifty pounds about you, Master Dry. However, let me see: if we take this little hollow way to the left, methinks it will lead us to the hamlet just below the old church. I could stow you away in that building, as a young friend of mine was once served by some of your people, while I send for some of my own men to keep guard over you, and I go and report myself."

"No, not there! not there!" cried he of Longsoaken, turning paler than ever. "No, no! But there is an alehouse farther on, where we could find accommodation. They are good and pious people there."

"For which reason I will have nothing to do with them," answered the profane captain. "No, but I know of a tavern just a mile from Beverley, where you can be lodged safely, Mr. Dry; and as, if you are taken and hanged, I lose five hundred good pounds, you may be quite sure that I will take as much pains to keep your neck out of the halter as I will to guard against your escape. We will talk about the means of getting the money from Bishop's Merton hereafter; so now come on quick. We shall turn the flank of that party we saw upon the hill in five minutes, without their seeing us, if we keep in the hollow way; and should we meet any stragglers, you must either keep a silent tongue in your head or curse and swear like a trooper."

"Heaven forbid!" exclaimed Mr. Dry, turning up his eyes.

"Phoo!" cried Captain Barecolt, "I know you would trample on the cross as the Dutchmen do in Japan, to save your life;" and after the assertion of this undeniable fact he hurried forward, nor drew a rein till they reached the village, and the inn which he had mentioned.

They found three or four of the inferior followers of the court in possession of the public-house; but, though two of them were known to the politic captain, they were not personages whom he chose to trust; and, conveying Mr. Dry to an upper room, he bestowed a small piece of silver upon one of the boys of the place, to run up to Beverley and bring down one Corporal Curtis from his troop. In the mean while, he informed Mr. Dry that it would be as well if he would give up into his secure keeping, to be duly accounted for at an after period, all his worldly goods and chattels, including his tawny-sheathed steel-mounted sword; and, though that worshipful person submitted with but an ill grace to the law of necessity, the pitiless captain employed very searching measures to ascertain that he retained nothing, either on his person or in his saddle-bags, but a decent change of apparel. When this was done, as Corporal Curtis had not yet appeared, Captain Barecolt called for a pottle of good wine, the cost of which he disbursed from Mr. Dry's store, noting it carefully down in a small, dirty memorandum-book, as he sagely remarked that he would have to reckon with that gentleman when they parted. The last cup was in the pottle-pot, and the gallant officer was seriously thinking of calling for more, when a tall, athletic man was ushered in, having some resemblance to Barecolt himself, into whose hands the captain consigned Mr. Dry, with a positive and loud injunction not to lose sight of him even for a moment, and to shoot him through the head if he attempted to escape.

Corporal Curtis promised to obey, saying drily, with a nod at their companion, that he remembered the march from Bishop's Merton; and Barecolt, leaving him in such good hands, mounted his horse and rode off to Beverley. He was kept there for many hours before he could obtain a private audience of Lord Walton; but at the end of that period he was closeted with the young nobleman for a long time, and when their conference was at an end they walked away together to the quarters of Major Randal, where another long private conversation took place. What passed might be difficult as well as tedious to tell; but in the end, towards five o'clock of the afternoon, Captain Barecolt returned to the village, where he had left his captive, accompanied by two stout troopers selected by himself from his own troop; and ascending to the chamber of Mr. Dry, he announced to him, in a tone that admitted of no reply, that he must mount and accompany him at once towards Bishop's Merton.

"I have determined, most worshipful sir," he said, as soon as he had sent Corporal Curtis out of the room, "to see you safe on your way till we are within half-a-day's march of Longsoaken. You will then have the goodness to give an order for the payment of your ransom to one of my friends, who will rejoin us when he has received it, and then I will set you free."

"How do I know you will do that?" demanded Dry, of Longsoaken, in a sullen tone.

"By making use of your common sense, Mr. Dry," replied Captain Barecolt. "Could I not hang you now if I liked it? Can I not hang you now if it pleases me? Will I not hang you now if you affect to doubt the honour of a gentleman and a soldier? So no more on that score, but descend, mount, and march--as you needs must."

There was no remedy And Mr. Dry obeyed, with vague hopes indeed of making his escape by some fortunate accident on the way. He argued that, in the distracted state of the country, it was barely possible for Captain Barecolt to pass across a great part of England without either encountering some force of the opposite party or pausing in some town which had espoused the parliamentary cause, and he believed that in either case his liberation must take place. But he little knew the forethought of that great stratagetic mind. Barecolt had furnished himself with correct information regarding the views and feelings of all the places he had to pass; and, instead of taking his way by Coventry and Worcester, he led his little troop direct to Nottingham, Derby, and Shrewsbury, almost in the same course that the king followed shortly after; and at every halting-place Mr. Dry found himself so strictly watched that his hopes declined from hour to hour. He was never left alone, even for a moment, Captain Barecolt himself, or one of the three soldiers who accompanied him, remaining with him night and day. The only chance that seemed left was in meeting with some friends as the party approached Bishop's Merton; but when Mr. Dry remembered that he was totally unarmed, his heart, never the most firm or most daring, felt inconceivably low at the thought of a struggle; and the sanguinary and ferocious conversation of his captor, the list of slain that his arm had sent to their long account, the bloody battles he had seen, and the dire deeds he had done, made him tremble for the result of any attempt to escape.

At length familiar objects began to greet the eyes of Mr. Dry. He saw places and things which he had often seen before, and knew that he must be within one day's journey of Bishop's Merton; and the very feeling revived in some degree his fainting courage. "Surely," he thought, "the people here must have retained their devotion to the good cause." But, alas! as he rode one morning into a town where he had often bought and sold, he beheld a party of Lord Hertford's horse sitting jesting with the girls in the market-place; and the conversation which he heard as he went along showed him that times had changed, and that people had changed with them.

On leading him up, as had been the inviolable custom since they set out, to a high room in the inn, Captain Barecolt, with a stern tone and countenance, told Corporal Curtis to set a soldier at the door, and to suffer no one to enter. Then waving his captive to a seat, he took a stool opposite, and after a solemn pause addressed him thus:--

"Now, worshipful Master Dry, doubtless you have been puzzling the small wits that God has given you to discover how it happens that an officer like myself, high in the king's confidence, has been induced to traverse so great an extent of country, solely for the purpose of receiving from a mechanical and trading person like yourself the pitiful sum of five hundred pounds, which might have been transmitted by various other means; and it is but fitting that you should know the worst. I and other persons of high rank and station have been made acquainted how, on the death of a poor old man, one Sergeant Neil, you rifled his cottage, and possessed yourself, amongst other things, of sundry papers appertaining to a young lady, who for some years has gone under the name of Arrah Neil, and was supposed to be his grand-daughter.--Don't interrupt me. Having brought you thus far, it is necessary to tell you, that besides an order upon some wealthy man at Bishop's Merton for the five hundred pounds before mentioned, which I shall send on by one of my troopers, it is necessary to your safety and liberation that you should furnish Corporal Curtis with an exact statement of where the said papers are to be found in your house at Longsoaken, and with an order to your people there to aid and assist my said corporal in searching for and finding those documents, expressly stating that you have immediate need of them--don't interrupt me--which indeed is the exact truth; for you must know that I have authority, under the hand of competent persons, in case you should show any reluctance to deliver up property belonging to other people, which you have stolen, to hang you upon the branch of a convenient tree in Wilbury Wood, as one taken in arms in open rebellion, otherwise in flagrant delict, worshipful Master Dry. While dinner is getting ready, therefore, you will be good enough to think deliberately over these particulars, and make up your mind as to whether you will like the state of suspense at which I have hinted better than a surrender of that which is not yours."

The varieties of hue which Mr. Dry's countenance had assumed while he listened to this long oration cannot be described here, for the very attempt would require us to go through almost every shade that ever graced a painter's pallet. Captain Barecolt had three times told him not to interrupt him, but it was a very unnecessary caution, as that worthy gentleman was too much confounded and thunderstruck to be able to utter a word; and when at length his captor rose, and, going to the door, conversed with the soldier for a few minutes, he remained in a state of impotent rage, bitterness, and disappointment, which had the curious effect of making him bite his under lip well-nigh through with his teeth.

Captain Barecolt was inexorable, however; the dinner was served; and Mr. Dry, though he could with difficulty be brought to eat a mouthful, drank a good deal. The dinner was over, and Captain Barecolt called for writing materials, which were laid before the unfortunate Mr. Dry. He paused, and his hand shook; but the captain was wonderfully calm and composed. He enjoyed the operation very much.

"First, if you please, worshipful Master Dry," he said, "the order on some responsible citizen of Bishop's Merton for five hundred pounds, to be paid at sight; and you will be good enough to eschew the word 'ransom,' putting in that it is for your private necessities."

Mr. Dry wrote as he was directed, and then Captain Barecolt, having examined the paper, placed another sheet before him, saying, "Now for the order to your steward, housekeeper, and all others of your people at Longsoaken, to aid and assist Mr. Curtis: eschew the word 'corporal,' and merely style him 'your friend'--to search for, &c. &c."

Mr. Dry again paused, and Captain Barecolt added, "Remember, I do not press you. I have orders not to press you. If you sign, well; we will go on to a certain cave you know of in Wilbury Wood, where I will keep you company till my men return, and as soon as I find that all which is required comes safe to hand, I will instantly set you free without let or hindrance. But if you refuse to sign, I am not to press you--no, not in the least: I am only to hang you in Wilbury Wood as a terror to all offenders. No, I do not press you in the least, Mr. Dry. Act as in your judgment you shall think it expedient."

Mr. Dry took the pen once more, and with a wavering and uncertain hand wrote down the order, very nearly in the terms which Captain Barecolt had dictated. He then stopped a moment, dipped the pen in the ink, gazed in the officer's face, and then added his name.

"Hal ha! ha!" cried Captain Barecolt, taking the paper with a mocking laugh. "Here is a man who prefers giving up things that don't belong to him to being hung in a nice cool wood. What an extraordinary taste!" and walking to the door he put his head out, saying, "Saddle the horses."

"Devil!" cried Mr. Dry, of Longsoaken, setting his teeth hard; and at the same time, by a rapid but silent movement, he drew a long, sharp-pointed knife off the table, and hastily put it in his pocket.

"Come, Mr. Dry," said Barecolt, turning round, "we shall soon part if your people obey your orders and your correspondent pays the money; so we may as well have another tankard to drink to our next merry meeting. It will make but a small item in your bill. Holloa, there! Bring another tankard, and mind it be of the best."

But when the wine came Mr. Dry refused to drink, saying sullenly that he had had enough to quench his thirst for a week. Captain Barecolt laughed again, for the writhing of his victim was pleasant to him; and taking up the large jug of wine he replied, "We have not had you long enough amongst us, Mr. Dry: you should really bear us company a little longer, to learn to drink deep. This is the way a true soldado discusses a stoup of good Bordeaux," and setting the brim to his lips, he never took it away till the tankard was empty.

"Now, to horse! to horse!" he cried, and making Mr. Dry go down and mount before him, he sprang lightly upon horseback, seeming all the more brisk and active for his liquor.

After some little shaking of hands and bidding good-bye between Captain Barecolt and his men and the troopers of Lord Hertford, in the streets, the captain's little party rode out of the town, and were soon in the midst of fields and lanes again. Then came a wide, bare common, extending for three or four miles on every side; and as they crossed it, a large old wood appeared lying straight before them, and falling into deep waves of brown foliage, with misty dells between.

"Ay, there is old Wilbury Wood, Master Dry," said Captain Barecolt; "you know it well, I dare say."

"You seem to know it well too," answered the Puritan, eyeing him askance.

"To be sure I do," replied the renowned captain; "and while the men are gone upon their errand, I will tell you how. Keep your curiosity cool till then, Master Dry, and you shall be satisfied."

"I have no curiosity about it," growled the Puritan.

"Well, then, you shall hear, whether you have curiosity or not," answered the captain; and on they rode, following a somewhat lonely and unfrequented path into the heart of the wood. The old trees rose around them in wild groups and strange fantastic forms; the hares bounded away in the underwood, and the squirrels, crossing the path, ran gaily up the trees, while a jay flew on before and scolded them from a bough overhead.

"I think this should be the turning," said the gallant captain, at length. "Does not this lead to the cave, Master Dry?"

"Seek it yourself if you want it," said his companion.

"You are discourteous, knave!" said Barecolt, giving him a blow on the ribs that made the worthy gentleman's breath come short. "Learn to be civil to your betters;" and turning his horse up the path, at the mouth of which he had stopped, he led his little party with unerring sagacity to a high rocky promontory in the wood, in the base of which appeared a hollow, some ten or twelve feet deep. He there dismounted and made Mr. Dry do the same, and, seeing him safely lodged in the cave, he gave one of the papers to Corporal Curtis, saying, "Take Jukes with you, and do as I told you, corporal. Avoid the town, and be back before dark; for if they do not give up the papers, I shall want you to help to hang our friend there."

His back was turned to Master Dry; and as he uttered these words aloud, he winked upon the corporal significantly with one small eye.

"They will obey my order," said Dry.

"I trust they will," rejoined Barecolt, solemnly. "You, James, take this to Bishop's Merton, and get the money. You may tell Master Winkfield, on whom it is drawn, that Master Dry wants it sadly. So he does, poor man! Look about the town, too, before you return, and see what is going on. I heard this morning that they are turning loyal; and if so, I may honour them with a visit myself some day."

The men rode away, and Captain Barecolt, after having secured the horses to two trees, took his pistols from the saddle and rejoined his prisoner in the cave. There seating himself on the ground, with his long legs stretched out across the mouth of the excavation, he beckoned Mr. Dry with a commanding air to seat himself also. It was easy to perceive that Captain Barecolt had been rendered somewhat more grand in his own opinion by the last stoup of wine, which he had tossed off with no more ceremony than if it had been a gill; and his captive, feeling that it might be dangerous to oppose him even in a trifle, instantly seated himself on the ground, being at the time somewhat weary with a ride of more than thirty miles that morning.

Captain Barecolt first began by examining the priming of his pistols, the muzzles of which every now and then swept Mr. Dry's person in a manner that made him very uncomfortable; but when this operation was finished and the pistols were replaced in his belt, the royalist officer turned his looks upon Mr. Dry with a sort of compassionate contempt that was extremely irritating. "Ah! Master Dry, Master Dry!" he said, "both you and I know this wood very well. You often used to come here when you were an apprentice boy with old Nicholas Cobalter; and many a pound of sugar and salt you hid away in that corner, just behind where you are now sitting; many an ounce of pepper you laid in the nook just over your head, till you could dispose of your pilferings."

Mr. Dry said nothing, but gazed at Captain Barecolt from under his bent brows, with a look of hatred and fear, such as might be supposed to pass over his countenance if he had seen the infernal spirit.

"Ay," continued the officer, in a somewhat maudlin and sentimental tone, "those were pleasant days, Mr. Dry, especially when you used to take a walk in this wood with buxom Mrs. Cobalter, when her husband went to London town; and she used to say, if ever he died you should be her second, because you were tender of her feelings, and connived at her dealing with the pottle-pot more freely than her husband liked."

"And who the devil are you?" cried Mr. Dry, furiously, forgetting all his sanctity in the irritating state of apprehension and astonishment to which he was reduced.

"Ay, those were merry times, Master Dry," continued Barecolt, without noticing his intemperate question, and fixing one eye upon his companion's face, while the other rolled vacantly round the cave, as if searching for memories or ideas. "Yes, Master Dry, no one would have thought to see you the master of Longsoaken in those days. But it all came of the widow, and your stepping in, by her help, into all that old Cobalter left. Fair or foul, Master Dry, it matters not--you got it, and that made a man of you."

"And who in the fiend's name are you?" demanded the Puritan, almost springing at his throat.

"I will tell you, Ezekiel Dry," answered Barecolt, bending forward and gazing sternly in his face--"I will tell you. I am Daniel Cobalter--ay, little Daniel, the old man's only nephew--his brother's son, whom with the widow's aid you cheated of his uncle's inheritance, and left to go out into the world with five crown-pieces and a stout heart; and, now that I have you here face to face in Wilbury Wood, what have you to say why I should not blow your brains out for all that you have done to me and mine?"

Mr. Dry, of Longsoaken, shrank into nothing, while Barecolt continued to gaze upon him as sternly as if he could have eaten him alive. A moment after, however, the gallant captain's face relaxed its awful frown, and with a withering and contemptuous smile he went on:--"But set your mind at ease, worm! You are safe in my scorn. I have done better for myself than if I had been tied down to a mechanical life. But take warning by what has happened, and do not let me catch you any more at these tricks, or I will put my boot heel upon your head and tread your brains out like a viper's. There--sit there, and be silent till the men come back; for, if I see you move or hear you speak, you will raise choler in me."

The gallant captain rose, and stood for a minute in the mouth of the cave, then returned again and seated himself, looking at Dry with a sneering smile. "Now art thou hammering thy poor thin brains to find how Daniel Cobalter has become Captain Barecolt; but if thou twistest the letters into proper form, thou wilt find that I have not taken one from any man's name but my own. This is no robbery, Dry."

"Nay, I see! I see!" said the Puritan.

"Ay! dost thou so?" rejoined Barecolt; "then see and be silent;" and he leaned his head upon his hand and gazed forth from the mouth of the cave. Presently, Captain Barecolt's head nodded and his breath came more heavily. Dry, of Longsoaken, gazed at him with his small eyes full of fierce and baleful light; but his face did not grow red or heated with the angry passion that was evidently working within him; on the contrary, it was as white as that of a corpse. "Ruin!" he muttered in a low voice to himself--"ruin!" and at the same time he put his right hand into his pocket, where he had concealed the knife.

But Captain Barecolt suddenly raised his head. "You moved!" he said sternly.

"It was but for my ease," answered Dry in a whining tone; "this ground is very hard."

"Sit still!" rejoined the captain, frowning, and then resumed the same attitude. In two or three minutes he breathed hard again, and then he snored, for he had drunk much wine and ridden far. For a few minutes Mr. Dry thought he was feigning sleep, and yet it seemed very like reality--sound, heavy, dull.

"It must be speedily, or not at all!" he thought to himself; "the other men may soon be back. Softly! I will try him;" and rising, he affected to look out of the mouth of the cave. Captain Barecolt slept on.

Ezekiel Dry trembled very much, but he quietly put his hand once more into his pocket and drew forth the knife. He grasped it tight; he took a step forward to the sleeping man's side. Barecolt, accustomed to watch, started and was rising; but ere he could gain his feet the blow descended on his right breast, and, leaving the knife behind, Dry darted out of the cave.

The blood gushed forth in a stream; but with a quick and firm hand Barecolt drew a pistol from his belt, cocked it, took a step forward, levelled, and fired. Dry, of Longsoaken, sprang up a foot from the ground, and fell heavily upon the forest grass, his blood and brains scattered around.

"Ha!" cried Barecolt; "ha, Master Dry! But I feel marvellous faint--very faint: I will sit down;" and, resuming his seat, he leaned back, while his face became as pale as ashes and the pistol fell from his hands.