ut
that now. Well, we had better go off to sleep, Luka; we have been
tramping fully eighteen hours, and I feel as tired as a dog."

In a few minutes they were fast asleep, but they were on their feet
again at daybreak and journeyed steadily for the next three days, always
keeping near the edge of the forest. On the fourth day they saw a small
farm-house lying not far from the edge of the wood.

"Here is the place that we have been looking for for the last week,"
Godfrey said. "This is where we must manage to get clothes. The question
is, how many men are there there? Not above two or three, I should say.
But anyhow we must risk it."

They waited until they saw lights in the cottage, and guessed that the
family had all returned from their work.

"Now then, Luka, come along. You must look fierce, you know, and try to
frighten them a bit. But mind, if they refuse and show fight we must go
away without hurting them."

Luka looked up in surprise. "Why that?" he asked. "You could beat that
pig Kobylin as if he were a child, why not beat them and make them
give?"

"Because I am not going to turn robber, Luka. I know some of the
runaways do turn robbers, and murder peasants and travellers. You know
some of the men in the prison boasted of what they had done, but that is
not our way. We are honest men though we have been shut up in prison. I
am willing to pay for what I want as long as I have money, after that we
shall see about it. If these people won't sell we shall find others that
will."

They went quietly up to the house, lifted the latch and walked in,
holding their long knives in their hands. Two men were seated at table,
three women and several children were near the fire. There was a general
exclamation of alarm as the two convicts entered.

"Do not fear," Godfrey said loudly; "we do not wish to rob anyone. We
are not bandits, we are ready to pay for what we require, but that we
must have."

The men were both convicts who had long since served out their time.
"What do you want?" one of them asked.

"We want clothes. You need not be afraid of selling them to us. If we
were captured to-morrow, which we don't mean to be, we will swear to you
that we will not say where we obtained them. We are ready to pay the
full value. Why should you not make an honest deal instead of forcing us
to take life?"

"We will sell them to you," one of the men said after speaking a few
words in a low tone to the other, and then r