“Why,” says I, “’tis just this, cousin. I bear a despatch from Cromwell to Fairfax--here it is, stitched in my doublet. I should have delivered it last night, and because I have not done so, I shall certainly be hanged if Fairfax or Cromwell get hold of me. ’Tis a most grave dereliction of duty that cannot be pardoned. I shall most certainly die for it. So that you see, between being shot here and hanged before Fairfax’s tent door, I have a pretty choice; and faith!” I says, “it causes me some concern, for I am not tired of life, I assure you.” “And if you had not heard of our danger, you would have delivered your despatch last night?” she says. “Why,” I says, “I was horseless; but I should have made shift into camp somehow.” “And did you reflect?” she says, rising from her chair and standing before me, “upon what the consequences would be if you came here to warn us instead of going forward with your despatch? You knew that it was a question of our safety against your own----?” But what else she meant to say--and I scarce knew what she was anxious to get at--I had no opportunity of learning, for at that moment there rang out a discharge of musketry from the fold, answered by the shots from the corridor where Peter and Benjamin were stationed. “That’s a beginning,” says I, and ran off, leaving her there without further ceremony. IV. I found Peter and Benjamin reloading their pieces near the window which we had barricaded a few hours previously, and immediately called on them for news of what had happened. It appeared that as daylight came they had watched the stable door jealously, and at last had counted six of our assailants emerge from it with their muskets. They had gazed up at the window which they had already shattered, and evidently catching sight of the lads’ faces--for we had left spaces through which we might observe whatever went on without--they had discharged their pieces at it. Peter and Benjamin had discharged theirs in return as their assailants crowded back within the stable door, but they were doubtful as to whether they had hit any of them, though Peter thought he had seen one man clap his hand to his side as he hurried into shelter. “But they were in and out again like a lot o’ rabbits on a sand burrow,” says Benjamin. “You saw their fronts and backs within a minute.” “Poor sort of fighting,” says I, and bidding them stand to the post, I went to find John and Humphrey.