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For a moment or two she stood quite still, her senses strained to grasp the meaning, the purport of the present situation this madman on the watch outside the young Count, key in hand, swaggering up to the back door at ten o'clock, when most folk would be at supper in the barn, her father gone, the village street wrapped in darkness!
It was Archibald Bell-the-Cat, ever hereafter known by that name, who advanced to meet the swaggering intruder in all his pride of privilege and place, but with a welcome very different from that which the favourite expected, who had come, no doubt, to break up the whisperings of the conspirators and assert his own authority.
"I shall not lose a moment," said I, as he clattered down the stairs of the hotel, with that perfect swaggering nonchalance which a Frenchman is always an adept in; and I returned to my room, to meditate upon my numerous embarrassments, and think over the difficulties which every moment was contributing to increase the number of. "The indictment has certainly many counts," thought I.
After a good deal more swaggering and swearing for this African royalty could speak a little English, and knew most of its most blackguard phrases his sable majesty once more betook himself to his boat, and was rowed back to the bank.
Then in this Pagan temple may be seen a living specimen of a Brummagem Jupiter, with a cross of Vulcan, lion-faced, hairy, bearded, deep-mouthed swaggering, fluent in frank nonsense and bullying clap-trap, loved by the mob for his strength, and by the middle classes for his money. The lofty roof re-echoes with applause.
Now and then a crew of these half human sons of the forest would make their appearance in the streets of New Amsterdam, fantastically painted and decorated with beads and flaunting feathers, sauntering about with an air of listless indifference sometimes in the marketplace, instructing the little Dutch boys in the use of the bow and arrow at other times, inflamed with liquor, swaggering, and whooping, and yelling about the town like so many fiends, to the great dismay of all the good wives, who would hurry their children into the house, fasten the doors, and throw water upon the enemy from the garret windows.
Why come hollowing and whooping out cavalier ditties, like a drunken trooper of Prince Rupert, or one of Wilmot's swaggering body-guards?" "Because I may have been both one and t'other in my day, for aught that you know," replied Wildrake.
Less in accord with the quiet beauty of this October Sunday, a squad of loud-voiced, swaggering, half-intoxicated young men lounged under the trees, recounting incidents of yesterday's cock-fight or betting upon the wrestling-match next muster day. In contrast to the other vehicles, the Gilcrest family coach, with its span of glossy-coated bays, presently drew up before the church.
Stung with his unlooked-for downfall, bleeding from the first blow ever given him by mortal boy, and goaded to absolute frenzy by the taunts of his swaggering enemy, Billy sprang to his feet, and a moment later had succeeded in closing with the boy in a rough-and-tumble fight, in which his adversary was at a disadvantage, being considerably smaller, hampered, too, with his loose, unbuttoned coat and baggy trousers.
I'm nobody, now, but ex-cow hand, ex-gunman, once known as Louisiana, and soon to be known no more except as a drunken souse. So long!" He strode out of the door, swaggering a little. His képi was cocked defiantly. His legs, in the cavalry boots, showed a faint bend.
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