CHAPTER XXXIV.
LODGINGS FOR THE RETINUE.
THE beef-eaters arrived in the afternoon of the same day that Adam was arrested. Alighting from the coach, they did exactly what he had feared they would. They wended their way promptly to the Crow and Arrow.
Randolph and his henchmen, having missed their intended prey, at their first attempt, were engaged elsewhere in the town, attempting to make good their failure. Believing Rust would return and attempt to see Mistress Merrill, Randolph kept one or two of his creatures in the vicinity of David Donner’s house day and night. But Gallows, being for the time totally disabled, had been domiciled at the tavern, in a small apartment off the tap-room, where he spent many hours of the day roaring out his exceeding displeasure at the turn of events and the consequences thereof, into which his friends had brought him.
Pike and Halberd appeared at the inn when the place was all but deserted. Naturally the tavern had become popular with the Royalists, but it had been gradually falling into disfavor with sailors and dock hands for several years.
Striding haughtily into the place, the beef-eaters accosted the landlord familiarly.
“My good fellow,” said little Pike, “be kind enough to let the Sachem know that we have arrived and wait upon his pleasure.”
“And assure him of the excellence of our health,” said Halberd.
“I don’t know what you mean,” said the landlord, eying the pair suspiciously and cudgeling his brains to remember where and when he had seen them before. “I have no Mr. Sachem in the house.”
“He has no Mr. Sachem in the house,” said the beef-eaters, in chorus, turning to one another with raised eyebrows and indulgent smiles.
“This surpasses belief,” said Halberd.
“My good friend, you mistook what we said,” added Pike. “We are inquiring for The Sachem—not Mr. Sachem, but The Sachem.”
“I don’t know the Sachem,” said the landlord, frowning upon the guests. “What do you want?”
“He don’t know the Sachem!” said the comrades, again in chorus. They looked perfectly incredulous.
“Then I pity you for your loss,” Pike remarked.
“But if he is not at this house, where is he?” asked Halberd.
“Tell us where to find him and we will burden you with wealth,” Pike added, grandly.
The landlord began to be certain they were crazy. “How should I know who it is you seek?” he asked.
“Water! fetch me water!” roared Gallows, from the adjoining room.
“What disturbance is this?” Halberd wanted to know. He strode to the door and looked in at the mountain of meat, propped up in bed, poulticed and patched past all semblance to himself. “Friend,” Halberd said to him, boldly, “your voice needs bleeding.”
“Ha!” bellowed Gallows, “you be a fool and I be the fool-killer! Let me get——Howtch!” He made this latter exclamation on attempting to rise from his lair.
Halberd and Pike both fell to the rear a step, at the awful voice of the brute, but no sooner did they see him sink helplessly down on the couch than they laughed in eloquent scorn.
“I should enjoy nothing better than to slay something large, before dinner,” little Pike remarked.
“Tut. This is my recreation,” said Halberd. “Come forth, friend, till I warm some cold steel in your belly.”
“Leave be!” commanded the landlord, coming forward to shut the door between the rooms, and flapping his apron at the belligerent beef-eaters. “Let me know your wants, if you have them, and if not, be off about your business.”
“Sensibly spoken,” said Halberd. “All we desire of you is that you let the Sachem know we are come.”
“But I said I didn’t know this Sachem!” cried the exasperated boniface.
“True, true,” said Pike. “But it seems too monstrous to be so.”
“But,” put in Halberd, “you must remember that wealthy young nobleman, who paved our way with gold, when we were with you a number of years ago. Surely you cannot yet have spent what we scattered in your house?”
“And you will certainly remember the drubbing we gave those varlets, with the flat of our swords, here in this very room—some dozen of the fellows there were in all,” added the other of the pair. “They dared to insinuate that we were beggars—aye, beggars, forsooth!”
The landlord remembered them now, clearly enough. He restrained himself from calling them vile names, by making an effort truly heroic.
“Oh, to be sure, I do recall it now,” he said, cunningly. “I believe your Sachem did even call here, to ask if you had come. Yes, yes. I think he said he meant to return here this afternoon again. Was he not a tall, noble-looking gentleman?”
“Like a king,” said Pike.
“With a manner like this,” added Halberd, strutting and swaggering across the room. “He should have walked in over several prostrate forms, in the manner of a prince and our associate.”
“The same, the very same,” agreed the landlord. “He is certain to be here within the hour. Sit down, gentlemen, and let me serve you, and then I shall be honored to have a look about, myself, to see if I may not find him.”
“Said like a scholar,” Halberd assured him.
“We do this honor to your house for his sake,” Pike added.
The two sat them down and the landlord hustled them out the vilest drink he could draw, tampered with, as it was, to add some crude substance, the effect of which on the brain was overpowering. The fellow saw the beef-eaters drinking and waited for nothing more. He scampered away from the rear of his place, as fast as his limbs could convey him.
Fifteen minutes later a small army of constables arrived, captured the two brain-fuddled beef-eaters without the slightest resistance and carried them off to the sumptuous apartments of the city jail. There, with aching heads and crestfallen countenances, they discovered themselves to be, when the baleful effects of their drink had somewhat abated.
“By my fighting hand!” said Halberd, “I’d not be sworn that we have not been tricked.”