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No sooner, however, had the door closed on the clergyman than a titter went round the table. Matthew was still at a white heat. Accustomed as he was to "tum'le" his neighbors at the Red Lion, he was now profoundly agitated. It was not frequently that he brought down such rare game in his sport. "Mattha Branthet," said Reuben Thwaite, "what, man, thoo didst flyte the minister!
"You have him there, Mattha Branthet," said the others with a laugh, "a feckless fool." The young dalesman leaned back on the bench, took a draught of his liquor, rested the pot on his knee, and looked into the fire with the steady gaze of one just out of the darkness. After a pause he said quietly, "I'll wager there's never a man among you dare go up to Sim's cave to-night.
"It's a bad night, Mattha Branthet," said a new-comer. "Dost tak me for a born idiot?" asked the old man. "Dost think I duddent known that afore I saw thee, that thou must be blodderen oot, It's a bad neet, Mattha Branthet?" There was a dash of rustic spite in the old man's humor which gave it an additional relish. "Ye munnet think to win through the world on a feather bed, lad," he added.
The dame had taken the good will for the good deed, and had not looked the gift-horses too closely in the mouth. "Good night, Mattha Branthet," she said, in answer to his good by; "good night, and God bless thee." Matthew had opened the door, and was looking out preparatory to his final leavetaking. "The sky's over-kessen to-neet," he said. "There's na moon yit, and t'wind's high as iver.
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