In five days after receiving this I was at Wilna, and two months later I saw England again, after an absence of three years. Early in November, 1558, Master Bertie and I landed at Lowestoft, having made the passage from Hamburg in a trading vessel of that place. We stopped only to sleep one night, and then, dressed as traveling merchants, we set out on the road to London, entering the city without accident or hindrance on the third day after landing. CHAPTER XVIII. THE WITCH'S WARNING. "One minute!" I said. "That is the place." Master Bertie turned in his saddle, and looked at it. The light was fading into the early dusk of a November evening, but the main features of four cross streets, the angle between two of them filled by the tall belfry of a church, were still to be made out. The east wind had driven loiterers indoors, and there was scarcely any one abroad to notice us. I pointed to a dead wall ten paces down one street. "Opposite that they stopped," I said. "There was a pile of boards leaning against it then." "You have had many a worse bedchamber since, lad," he said, smiling. "Many," I answered. And then by a common impulse we shook up the horses, and trotting gently on were soon clear of London and making for Islington. Passing through the latter we began to breast the steep slope which leads to Highgate, and coming, when we had reached the summit, plump upon the lights of the village, pulled up in front of a building which loomed darkly across the road. "This is the Gatehouse Tavern," Master Bertie said in a low voice. "We shall soon know whether we have come on a fool's errand--or worse!" We rode under the archway into a great courtyard, from which the road issued again on the other side through another gate. In one corner two men were littering down a line of packhorses by the light of the lanterns, which brought their tanned and rugged faces into relief. In another, where the light poured ruddily from an open doorway, an ostler was serving out fodder, and doing so, if we might judge from the travelers' remonstrances, with a niggardly hand. From the windows of the house a dozen rays of light shot athwart the darkness, and disclosed as many pigs wallowing asleep in the middle of the yard. In all we saw a coarse comfort and welcome. Master Bertie led the way across the yard, and accosted the ostler. "Can we have stalls and beds?" he asked. The man stayed his chaffering, and looked up at us. "Every man to his business," he replied gruffly. "Stalls, yes; but of beds I know nothing. For women's work go to the women." "Right!" said I, "so we will. With better luck than you would go, I expect, my man!" Bursting into a hoarse laugh at this--he was lame and one-eyed and not very well-favored--he led us into a long, many-stalled stable, feebly lit by lanterns which here and there glimmered against the walls. "Suit yourselves," he said; "first come is first served here."