"I thought, sir, that by making my visit so early, I should have found you at home," was Captain Delaware's brief rejoinder. "Business called me abroad," replied Mr. Tims, as laconically. "Were you going toward Emberton Park?" demanded the young officer. "No, sir, I was not!" answered Mr. Tims, whose manner toward the son of "poor Sir Sidney Delaware," was always very different from that which he assumed to rich Mr. Burrel, and was peculiarly simple on the present occasion. "You were not!" cried Captain Delaware; "then, let me tell you, sir, you should have been there yesterday. I beg to know, sir, why you were not to the time you yourself appointed for the signature of the mortgage, and the payment of the money advanced." "Because it was not convenient, sir, and because the money was not ready," replied Mr. Tims, with imperturbable calmness. Captain Delaware's command over himself abandoned him; and, raising the whip he had in hand, he shook it over the miser's head, exclaiming, "Not convenient! Not ready! By Heaven! if it were not for your years, I would make you find it convenient to keep your word when you have pledged it, and to be ready at the time you promise!" He was dropping the whip, though his eyes were still flashing, when a voice close beside him, proceeding from an honest neighboring farmer, whose approach he had not observed, exclaimed, "Captain! Captain! Don't ye strike the old man! Don't ye, now! Don't ye! Oh, that's right, now--reason it with him, like--but don't ye strike him!" "No, no, Ritson, I am not going to strike him!" replied Captain Delaware. "Go on, my good fellow, and leave us; I will not strike him!" "Well, well, captain," said the farmer, laughing, "I'll go--but your word's given, mind. So, don't ye strike the old man, though he were the devil himself. He looks more like a wet hen under a penthouse, howsomever." The farmer's description was not far from correct; for Mr. Tims, who had expected no such fierce explosion as that which his words had occasioned, and had fancied he could be insolent in security--now stood aghast, as the rhetoric of Captain Delaware's horsewhip seemed likely to be applied to his shoulders. His knees acquired an additional bend, his nether jaw dropped, his arms hung distant from his sides, his cheeks grew paler, and his red nose stood out in prominent relief, under the very act of fear. The good farmer's interposition, however, calmed him sufficiently to enable his tongue to falter forth some words of apology, declaring that he did not intend to offend Captain Delaware--far from it; but how could that gentleman expect him to speak boldly upon such subjects, out in the public high-road? Who could tell, he demanded, that there might not be robbers in the immediate neighborhood of the place where they then stood!