"I shouldn't have thought you'd have believed in
the like of that--but I do--that old devil's dam, dame Parker, that
lives alone up in Hatherleigh Wood, got gibbering some infernal
nonsense at me the other day, for shooting her black cat. I made the
cross in the road though, so I suppose it won't come to anything."

"Perhaps not," said Lee; "but I'd sooner kill a man than a black cat."

Another pause. The tobacco, so much stronger than any George had been
accustomed to, combined with the cold, made him feel nervous and
miserable.

"When I was a boy," resumed Lee, "there were two young brothers made it
up to rob the 'squire's house, down at Gidleigh. They separated in the
garden after they cracked the crib, agreeing to meet here in this very
place, and share the swag, for they had got nigh seventy pound. They
met and quarrelled over the sharing up; and the elder one drew out a
pistol, and shot the younger dead. The poor boy was sitting much where
you are sitting now, and that long tuft of grass grew up from his
blood."

"I believe that's all a lie," said George; "you want to drive me into
the horrors with your humbugging tales."

Lee, seeing that he had gone far enough, if not too far, proposed,
somewhat sulkily, that they should begin to talk about what brought
them there, and not sit crouching in the wet all night.

"Well," said George, "it's you to begin. What made you send for me to
this infernal place?"

"I want money," said Lee.

"Then you'd better axe about and get some," said George; "you'll get
none from me. I am surprised that a man with your knowledge of the
world should have sent me such a letter as you did yesterday, I am
indeed--What the devil's that?"

He started on his feet. A blaze of sudden light filled the nook where
they were sitting, and made it as bright as day, and a voice shouted
out,

"Ha, ha, ha! my secret coves, what's going on here? something quiet and
sly, eh? something worth a fifty-pound note, eh? Don't you want an
arbitrator, eh? Here's one, ready made."

"You're playing a dangerous game, my flash man, whoever you are," said
Lee, rising savagely. "I've shot a man down for less than that. So
you've been stagging this gentleman and me, and listening, have you?
For just half a halfpenny," he added, striding towards him, and drawing
out a pistol, "you shouldn't go home this night."

"Don't you be a fool, Bill Lee;" said the new comer. "I saw the light
and made towards it, and a