us, and we elbowed one another as we crouched by the fire.

He turned a rambling eye on us, but showed no surprise.

"Blight him! Blight him! Blight him!" said the little old man.

"Blight him! Blight him! Blight him!" said I, deeming it well to fall in
with his humour.

"Ay--who?" he asked.

"The one you mean."

"Ay,--Blight him! Blight him! Blight him!" and he lifted a bottle from the
ground between his knees, and took a pull at it, and passed it on to me. I
drank and passed it to Le Marchant, and the fiery spirit ran through my
veins like new hot life.

"We are starving. Give us to eat," I said, and the old man pointed to a
hole in the side of the hut. I thrust in my hand and found bread, dark
coloured and coarse, but amazingly sweet and strengthening, and a lump of
fat bacon. We divided it without a word, and ate like famished dogs. And
all the time the old man chaunted "Blight him!" with fervour, and drank
every now and then from the bottle. We drank too as we ate, but sparingly,
lest our heads should go completely, though we could not believe such
hospitality a trap.

It was a nightmare ending to a nightmare journey, but for the moment we
had food and shelter and we asked no more. When we had eaten we curled
ourselves up on the floor and slept, with "Blight him! Blight him! Blight