Page:Marriott Watson--Galloping Dick.djvu/63

 “What do you mean?” he asks, in a startled voice.

“I am no head at a guess,” says I, sticking my finger at the thick, red soils upon his boots, "but I swear I can pin a point upon honest Quantock mud.”

I vow I never saw a man’s face flame to such a sudden passion. His colour blew as strong as his hair, and he clapped his hand to his sword, muttering very angrily and with a suggestion of terror.

I laughed, and poured out a glass from the bottle. “Mark me,” said I, with good humour, “’twas of honest Chiantock loam I spoke. And ’tween you and me I’ll warrant we are acquainted with the discrimination.”

“I am come,” says he sulkily, “from Worcester.”

“And sure,” says I, smiling, “that will serve very well to explain a monstrous appetite; and the rather that the road is poor, and the topsman hath a heavy hand.”

Now he looked at me, as I saw, in some perplexity, and with an ingenuous frown of