"What the devil do you mean," cried Sir Hilary to Dick, "by sending me off on a wild goose chase after my sister, when you have her in that room? Don't deny it, you scoundrel! Put down that sword, I say! What, you'd try to run me through, would you? You'd save my sister from being carried off by some damned hound" (Squire Bullcott, now utterly astounded, winced at this) "and then reward yourself by trying to ruin the girl yourself?" "So it is your sister in that room?" said Dick, standing with his back to the bedchamber door, and holding his sword in a way that accounted for the wordy hesitation of his would-be assailants. "The Squire insists it is his wife. Sure, it can't be both!" "Damn the Squire!" cried Sir Hilary. "'Tis my sister. She's nowhere else, and I paid a chambermaid half a guinea, who told me she was here!" "Don't be so fast about damning the Squire!" put in that worthy, taking heart and bristling up. "I paid a whole guinea to find out my wife was there. So it must be she! Besides, didn't the coachman that drove her send word back to me, from this inn, that she was running away? Didn't the messenger meet me at Hungerford, where I was--ah--on business? I tell you what, Sir Hilary, you and my man take that fellow's sword away, and I'll go in and see my wife!" "Devil take your wife!" said Sir Hilary. "'Tis my sister. I see her gown at this moment through the door-crack. I know that gown. There,--she's moved backed out of sight. Sis, come out!" "'Pon my word, gentlemen," said Dick, pretending to make light of the accusations of both, "'tis a very curious honor you are contesting for! And one of you sees a lady's gown where none exists! I don't know what to make of you!" But Bullcott seemed struck by Sir Hilary's asserted recognition of the dress. "Oh, well," said he, "maybe I'm wrong. Sir Hilary doubtless knows what inn his sister lodged at last night. Egad, if it turns out to be her, mayhap some folk won't be so prudish after this!" The Squire grinned to think the lady who had repulsed him, and whom he had failed to carry off, might be compromised after all.