"Willingly," said I, "but whatever else you do, you will certainly reach me my hat, otherwise, just so soon as you find yourself sufficiently recovered, I shall endeavor to throw you after it." Saying which, I laid aside my staff, and buttoned up my coat. "Why," he began, "you infernally low, dusty, ditch-trotting blackguard—" But his companion, who had been regarding me very closely, twitched him by the sleeve, and whispered something in his ear. Whatever it was it affected my antagonist strangely, for he grew suddenly very red, and then very white, and abruptly turned his back upon me. "Are you sure, Mostyn?" said he in an undertone. "Certain." "Well, I'd fight him were he the devil himself! Pistols perhaps would be—" "Don't be a fool, Harry," cried the other, and seizing his arm, drew him farther away, and, though they lowered their voices, I caught such fragments as "What of George?" "changes since your time," "ruin your chances at the start," "dead shot." "Sir," said I, "my hat—in the corner yonder." Almost to my surprise, the taller of the two crossed the room, followed by his friend, to whom he still spoke in lowered tones, stooped, picked up my hat, and, while the other stood scowling, approached, and handed it to me with a bow. "That my friend, Sir Harry Mortimer, lost his temper, is regretted both by him and myself," said he, "but is readily explained by the fact that he has been a long time from London, while I labored under a—a disadvantage, sir—until your hat was off." Now, as he spoke, his left eyelid flickered twice in rapid succession. "I beg you won't mention it," said I, putting on my hat; "but, sir, why do you wink at me?" "No, no," cried he, laughing and shaking his head, "ha! ha!—deyvilish good! By the way, they tell me George himself is in these parts—incog. of course—" "George?" said I, staring. "Cursed rich, on my life and soul!" cried the tall gentleman, shaking his head and laughing again. "Mum's the word, of course, and I swear a shaven face becomes you most deyvilishly!" "Perhaps you will be so obliging as to tell me what you mean?" said I, frowning. "Oh, by gad!" he cried, fairly hugging himself with delight. "Oh, the devil! this is too rich—too infernally rich, on my life and soul it is!" Now all at once there recurred to me the memory of Tom Cragg, the Pugilist; of how he too had winked at me, and of his incomprehensible manner afterwards beneath the gibbet on River Hill. "Sir," said I, "do you happen to know a pugilist, Tom Cragg by name?" "Tom Cragg! well, I should think so; who doesn't, sir?" "Because," I went on, "he too seems to labor under the delusion that he is acquainted with me, and—" "Acquainted!" repeated the tall gentleman, "acquainted! Oh, gad!" and immediately hugged himself in another ecstasy. "If," said I, "you will have the goodness to tell me for whom you evidently mistake me—"