"Rupert! Rupert!" she wailed. "They're killing him--yonder at the Spotted Dog! Oh, they're killing Rupert!" Somebody snatched her out of harm's way, as Dick Fowell swung his horse about. She saw him go galloping across the market-place, and she staggered after him. She felt a grasp on her arm, and she saw that it was Kit Woolgar who was holding her up. But she was past being surprised or frightened at anything. She did not remember how she had crossed the market-place. She was at the door of the Spotted Dog, and beside it she saw Dick Fowell's horse, with the saddle empty and a potboy holding the bridle. She was stumbling down the flagged passage. She had pitched into the taproom. There, on a bench, in the midst of the little group of musketeers, who were far from laughing now, sat Dick Fowell, and Rupert leaned against his arm. Rupert was white about the mouth, and he had one sleeve torn from his doublet. He was drinking from a cup that Fowell held to his lips, and he steadied it with a hand that shook a great deal. Between swallows he caught his breath, with a sobbing sound. Merrylips ran to his side and threw her arms about him. "I thought they would ha' slain thee!" she gasped. "They did--no such thing!" answered Rupert, jerkily. He shifted himself from Dick Fowell's hold and sat up, with his arm about her. "And I blacked--one fellow's eye for him--the scurvy rogue! And I didn't--drink for none on 'em! And we're both--king's men!" he ended, lifting his face to Dick Fowell. "And you can hang us--if you will! And we're not afeard! And God save the king!" "God save the king!" quavered Merrylips. And then they clung to each other, and wondered what would happen to them. Kit Woolgar began to talk, and the idlers and the tavern folk, who had crowded into the room, began to question and exclaim. But Dick Fowell bade them be silent, and in the silence he spoke briefly to the musketeers. Merrylips hoped that never in her life should she be spoken to by any one in a voice like that. When he had said the little that was to be said to men that found their sport in bullying children, he dismissed them, with a promise to speak further to their captain. Then Fowell turned to Kit Woolgar and bade him tell his story. And Woolgar told how he had taken up the two children at Long Wesselford, and how they had slipped from him, and all the false tale with which they had cheated him. At that Merrylips remembered how kind Polly and Kit had been, and how she and Rupert had deceived them, and she blushed and hung her head for shame. "Truth," said Fowell, when the tale was ended, "I must be that kinsman Smith whom these young ones sought in Ryeborough--eh, Tibbott Venner?" "You're merry, sir," replied Woolgar. "You're no carabineer in my lord's troop. You're my lord Caversham's son, and well I know your honor." "In any case," said Fowell, "I'll charge me with the custody of these two arrant king's men."