Page:Marriott Watson--Galloping Dick.djvu/78

 This took me right in the stomach for fellowship. “And ’fore gad,” says I a little roughly, “we’ll break a bottle on it.”

He tossed off his wine. “And ’fore gad, sir,” says he gaily, “we will.”

And thus it was that I became acquainted with Sir Ralph Leybourne. I called for the landlord, and Sir Ralph sat down, but then, seeming to recollect, turned to his prisoner, where he stood gloomily within a ring of the dragoons.

“Mr Baverstock,” says he, “I am no thief-taker, nor no spy-catcher neither, and if a gentleman of good west-country blood shall choose to set himself up a new sovereign, ’tis nothing against his gentility whatever it be to his oath. But an’ you will give me your word, you shall stay here, and,” here he swept a graceful bow towards me, “perhaps this gentleman will suffer me a guest and to order for us all.”

But Baverstock, if that was his name, merely gave him a savage look. “I will give no word,” said he.