We found him in the nook made by the turn of the stair, flung thither,
as it seemed, by the recoil of the great bell-mouthed blunderbuss which
he was still clutching. The fall had partly stunned him, but he was
alive enough to protest feebly that he would take a dozen oaths upon his
loyalty to the cause; that he had mistook us for some thieving marauders
of the other side; craftily leaving cause and party without a name till
he should have his cue from us.

Whereupon Richard loosed his neckcloth to give him better breathing
space, and bidding me see if the revelers had left a heel-tap of wine in
any bottle nearer than the wine cellar, lifted the old man and propped
him in the corner of the high-backed hall settle.

The wine quest led me to the banqueting-room. Here disorder reigned
supreme. The table stood as the roisterers had left it; the very wreck
and litter of a bacchanalian feast. Bottles, some with the necks struck
off, were scattered all about, and the floor was stained and sticky with
spilt wine and well sanded with shattered glass.

I found a remnant draining in one of the broken bottles, and a cup to
pour it in; and with this salvage from the wreck returned to Jennifer
and his charge. The old man had come to some better sensing of
things,--he had been vastly more frightened than hurt, as I
suspected,--and to Richard's eager questionings was able to give some
feebly querulous replies.

"Yes, they're gone--all gone, curse 'em; and they've taken every plack
and bawbee they could lay their thieving hands upon," he mumbled. "'Tis
like the dogs; to stay on here and eat and drink me out of house and
home, and then to scurry off when I'm most like to need protection."