said. "Would not your sword suffice against a man with empty hands?"

He passed the taunt in silence, and when the men had left me, said: "I
have come to speed your parting, Captain Ireton. You are a thick-headed,
witless fool, as you have always been; yet since you've blundered into
serving me, I would not grudge the time to come and thank you."

"I serve you?" I cried. "God knows I'd serve you up in collops at the
table of your master, the devil, could I but stand before you with a
carving tool!"

He laughed softly. "Always vengeful and vindictive, and always because
you must ever mess and meddle with other men's concerns," he retorted.
"And yet I say you've served me."

"Tell me how, in God's name, that I may not die with that sin unrepented
of."

"Oh, in many small ways, but chiefly in this affair with the little lady
of Appleby."

"Never!" I denied. "So far as decent speech could compass it, I have
ever sought to tell her what a conscienceless villain you are."

He laughed again at that.

"You know women but indifferently, my Captain, if you think to breach a
love affair by a cannonade of hard words. But I am in no humor to
dispute with you. You have lost, and I have won; and, were I not here to
come between, you'd look your last upon the things of earth in shortest