when he perceived me.

Noticing the great height of the fellow and that he still held his weapon, I kept well to the other side of the road, for I knew that destitution makes men desperate and that the chain that glittered on my waistcoat might be too great a temptation to him upon this lonely highway. I was confirmed in my fears when I saw him step out into the centre of the road and bar my progress.

“Well, my lad,” I said, affecting an ease which I by no means felt, “what can I do for you this morning?”

The fellow's face was the colour of mahogany with exposure to the weather, and he had a deep scar from the corner of his mouth to his ear, which by no means improved his appearance. His hair was grizzled, but his figure was stalwart, and his fur cap was cocked on one side so as to give him a rakish, semi-military appearance. Altogether he gave me the impression of being one of the most dangerous types of tramp that I had ever fallen in with.

Instead of replying to my question, he eyed me for some time in silence with sullen, yellow-shot eyes, and then closed his knife with a loud snick.

“You're not a beak,” he said, “too young for that, I guess. They had me in chokey at Paisley and they had me in chokey at Wigtown, but by the living thunder if another of them lays a hand on me I'll make him remember Corporal Rufus Smith! It's a darned fine country this, where they won't give a man work, and then lay him by the heels for having no visible means of subsistence.”

“I am sorry to see an old soldier so reduced,” said I. “What corps did you serve in?”

“H Battery, Royal Horse Artillery. Bad cess to the Service and everyone in it! Here I am nigh sixty years of age, with a beggarly pension of thirty-eight pound ten--not enough to keep me in beer and baccy.”

“I should have thought thirty-eight pound ten a year would have been a nice help to you in your old age,” I remarked.

“Would you, though?” he answered with a sneer, pushing his weather-beaten face forward until it was within a foot of my own. “How much d'ye think that slash with a tulwar is worth? And my foot with all the bones rattling about like a bagful of dice where the trail of the gun went across it. What's that worth, eh? And a liver like a sponge, and ague whenever the wind comes round to the east--what's the market value of that? Would you take the lot for a dirty forty 

 Prev. P 29/114 next