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Here Jack drew up another chair and I moved to make more room, so that he could sit next to Brocton, to whom he was soon detailing in eager whispers the result of his visit to the town hall. The others took up the broken links of talk, and this gave me an opportunity of inspecting the company. There could be no doubt about the man on my left.
Sneyd, a rattling good fellow, and I have tossed for stations, and when it comes to a battle he's to lead the yokels and I'm to follow behind, kicking the scum of London into the firing-line. Damn 'em. But I'll kick 'em right enough. Then there's Major Tixall major, by gad a slinking cut-throat, with a face the colour of pigs' liver. What he's majoring it for, Brocton and the devil alone know.
Yet he checked his horse when near me, and cried curtly, "What news from Stafford?" A word with him might be worth while, so I too pulled up and answered very politely, "It's market-day." "Damn the market! What news of the troops, sir? Is my Lord Brocton still there?" "I believe he is." "Then damn my Lord Brocton! Did you chance to see him?" "I had that honour late last night."
Who and what was this man "plain John Freake," as he called himself, who carried large sums of money, domineered over self-important burgesses and mayors, who was served by such well-appointed horsemen, whom Master Dobson, a parliament man, feared, and my Lord Brocton had thought it worth while to attempt to put out of the way?
His lordship, it seems, is busily piling up a big account with both of us. Well, in my own way, I'll make the rascal pay as dearly as you have in yours. If you will be pleased to accept my help, madam, I will do all I can for you. There are, fortunately, other means than carnal weapons of influencing such persons as Lord Brocton." "Like Master Wheatman, sir, you are too good to a poor girl."
The one clear thing was that I had got my neck right into the noose, and Brocton could, and would, pull tight at the first opportunity. What did all this matter? What did any untoward event or result matter? I was going to be a soldier, and, after the fashion of love-lorn Cherry-Cheeks, I said to myself, "I'll Jack him!"
Eurie, you are certain that your theological student did not cross the Atlantic in order to reach his elysium?" "Brocton is here," Eurie said, as they climbed the steps of the car. "I see the name on that building yonder; though whether 'here' is America or Asia I am unable to say. I think we have come overland, but it is so long since we started I may have forgotten."
"I will go no farther, Master Wheatman," she said in a low, troubled voice, "till you forgive me." "Forgive you?" I cried, astounded. "Forgive you? What for?" "For thinking meanly of you. I thought you were afraid of Brocton. Not until that lion leap of yours did I realize how cleverly and nobly you had sat there through his insults, foreseeing the exact moment when you could master him.
I wish Brocton would snap her up, but he can't. He'll never be more than an earl and I'm a marquess. Curse my luck! Fancy me a marquess! I'm a disgrace to my order and as poor as a crow." The 'jade' referred to was the nabob's only daughter and heiress, who was, as all the town knew, to make a great match.
For a minute or two I was unheeded, and the sergeant could hardly keep himself sufficiently stiff and awkward. His Grace was in the sourest of humours for, as the talk showed, he had been beaten. The claymores had taken the conceit out of him finely. He finished the subject with a string of oaths and then made an unprintable inquiry of Brocton concerning me.
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