He scarcely took the trouble to put contempt into his tone, contempt for their childish machinating, and Monjoy gave an embarrassed laugh. “Nay, what the devil’s this?” he exclaimed; and Cope peered at him, again patted the air mockingly, and gave the engraver the “La, Mr. Monjoy!” which he seemed to reserve especially for him. “Ay, Emmason can hand in his commission as soon as he likes,” was Matthew Moon’s comment when this was reported to him; and even Monjoy seemed unusually contemplative. But John Raikes was to be trusted, and money could be raised at a word. A rumour, too, of whatever nature, must have penetrated to Back o’ th’ Mooin, for there arrived from that quarter something that could only be regarded as a message for Jeremy Cope. Among other pretensions of this puerile, dangerous folk was one that their territory was theirs to the uttermost title, and that even right of passage along the Causeway was by their permission. A Back o’ th’ Mooiner would watch a stranger pass as you might good-humouredly sanction a trespass. Now to maintain such a right against the inroads of custom you have to refuse the privilege from time to time, and that was exactly what Back o’ th’ Mooin did one day to two men who had come up out of Lancashire. A score of the roughest of them--they were carrying heavy timbers from over Booth way--came upon these two men and bade them turn. Monjoy was in Horwick. The men pleaded urgency of affairs; they refused to hear them; they must go back till midnight. One of them (he must have been an irascible fellow) showed a disposition for fight, and a consultation was held on the spot. The name of Cope was mentioned, and at the whispered speech of one of them--it was Mish Murgatroyd--a guffaw broke forth. “Eh, that wad be a rare hint!” they cried, and they turned to the men, saying, “Ay, ye can go forward, but bide a bit.” A man set off at a run back to Booth, and when he returned it was with a bucket of pitch. They stripped the travellers to their boots and shirts, and when they had pitched them they cried, “Off wi’ ye; your clothes’ll be put at th’ top o’ Wadsworth Scout at midnight to-night. Gi’e ’em our love i’ Horwick.” Some Wadsworth men found them that night, lying in the heather in the moonlight, waiting for their clothes. And the odd thing was that when the tale got about Horwick none seemed to enjoy the jocularity of it so much as Cope himself. He heard it in the “Cross Pipes,” and he chuckled and smothered with laughter till his black-rimmed glasses were dim with his tears. “Rare fellows, rare fellows!” he wheezed; and the company, who had looked to see him take it differently, watched him warily. “Rare fellows!” he said, rubbing his glasses. “I remember, Mr. Monjoy, something you once said about law and custom; may I take this as part of your--shall I say sovereignty?” “No, you may not,” said Monjoy curtly.