"He challenges us all at once to fight him."

"Why, the fellow's mad or an Englishman."

"Yes," said Hunston, "an Englishman. That makes him feel he is a match
for a mob of Greeks, and I don't know that it is all madness."

Suddenly the stranger appeared to liven up.

"What, you are not the police, then?" he ejaculated.

"Police!" said Hunston, contemptuously turning round to the speaker.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Why, I took you for the police in pursuit of me."

"What have you been doing?"

"Am I among friends?"

"We are brigands, but you can speak freely."

"Well, then, I am an unlucky wretch who has been forced to bolt away
from his master and his living--and all for nothing."

"What do you call nothing?" said Toro.

"A trifling peccadillo, sir; nothing more, I assure you--merely a few