"Would you," he said, grinning. "Well, I was always the beauty of the
bunch." He bit off a piece of plug tobacco and began to chew
it. By-and-by he turned to Hugh to ask if he chewed tobacco. Hugh
answered "No," laughing.

"Ah," said the man, "don't you learn. That's my advice. It's not easy
to stop, once you begin."

He lay back in his corner, and seemed to pass into a sort of
day-dream. Presently he looked up at us again, and asked us if we knew
why we were there. We said that we did not.

"Well," he said, "it's like this. Last night you" (here he gave me a
nudge with his foot) "you young gentleman that looks so smart, you
went for a ride late at night, in the snow and all. See what came of
it. There was Others out for a ride last night, quite a lot of
'em. Others that the law would be glad to know of, with men so scarce
for the King's navy. Well, to-day the beaks are out trying to find
them other ones. There's a power of redcoats come here, besides the
preventives, and there they go, clackity clank, all swords and horses,
asking at every house."

"What do they ask," said Hugh.

"They ask a lot of things," said the man. "'Where was you last night?'
That's one question. 'What time did you come in last night?' That's
another. 'Let's have a look at your horse; he looks as though he'd bin
out in the snow last night.' Lots of things they ask, and if they got
a hold of you, young master, why, you might have noticed things last
night, and perhaps they might pump what you noticed out of you. So