Lovett drew back, and while he was searching in his pockets for writing
implements, which he always carried about him, the traveller seized the
opportunity, and suddenly snatching a pistol from the pocket of the
carriage, levelled it full at the head of the robber. The traveller was
an excellent and practised shot,--he was almost within arm's length of
his intended victim,--his pistols were the envy of all his Irish friends.
He pulled the trigger,--the powder flashed in the pan; and the
highwayman, not even changing countenance, drew forth a small ink-bottle,
and placing a steel pen in it, handed it to the nobleman, saying, with
incomparable _sanq froid_: "Would you like, my lord, to try the other
pistol? If so, oblige me by a quick aim, as you must see the necessity
of despatch. If not, here is the back of a letter, on which you can
write the draft."

The traveller was not a man apt to become embarrassed in anything save
his circumstances; but he certainly felt a little discomposed and
confused as he took the paper, and uttering some broken words, wrote the
check. The highwayman glanced over it, saw it was written according to
form, and then with a bow of cool respect, returned the watch, and shut
the door of the carriage.

Meanwhile the servant had been shivering in front, boxed up in that
solitary convenience termed, not euphoniously, a dickey. Him the robber
now briefly accosted.

"What have you got about you belonging to your master?" "Only his pills,
your honour! which I forgot to put in the--"

"Pills!--throw them down to me!" The valet tremblingly extricated from
his side-pocket a little box, which he threw down and Lovett caught in