“Take us, if you can,” cries Dawson; “and the Lord have mercy on the first who comes within my reach!”

Deftly enough, old Simon, snatching the fellow’s cap who stood next him, flings it at the candle that stands flaring on the floor, and justles the constable’s lanthorn from his hand, so that in a moment we were all in darkness.  Taking us at this disadvantage (for Dawson dared not lay about him with his axe, for fear of hitting me by misadventure), the rascals closed at once; and a most bloody, desperate fight ensued.  For, after the first onslaught, in which Dawson (dropping his axe, as being useless at such close quarters) and I grappled each our man, the rest, knowing not friend from foe in the obscurity, and urged on by fear, fell upon each other,—­this one striking out at the first he met, and that giving as good as he had taken,—­and so all fell a-mauling and belabouring with such lust of vengeance that presently the whole place was of an uproar with the din of cursing, howling, and hard blows.  For my own lot I had old Simon to deal with, as I knew at once by the cold, greasy feel of his leathern jerkin, he being enraged to make me his prisoner for the ill I had done him.  Hooking his horny fingers about my throat, he clung to me like any wildcat; but stumbling, shortly, over two who were rolling on the floor, we went down both with a crack, and with such violence that he, being undermost, was stunned by the fall.  Then, my blood boiling at this treatment, I got astride of him, and roasted his ribs royally, and with more force than ever I had conceived myself to be possessed of.  And, growing beside myself with this passion of war, I do think I should have pounded him into a pulp, but that two other combatants, falling across me with their whole weight, knocked all the wind out of my body, oppressing me so grievously, that ’twas as much as I could do to draw myself out of the fray, and get a gasp of breath again.

About this time the uproar began to subside, for those who had got the worst of the battle thought it advisable to sneak out of the house for safety, and those who had fared better, fearing a reverse of fortune, counted they had done enough for this bout, and so also withdrew.

“Are you living, Kit?” asks Dawson, then.

“Aye,” says I, as valiantly as you please, “and ready to fight another half-dozen such rascals,” but pulling the broken door open, all the same, to get out the easier, in case they returned.

“Why, then, let’s go,” says he, “unless any is minded to have us stay.”

No one responding to this challenge, we made ado to find a couple of hats and cloaks for our use and sallied out.

“Which way do we turn?” asks Dawson, as we come into the road.

“Whither would you go, Jack?”

“Why, to warn Moll of her danger, to be sure.”

I apprehended no danger to her, and believed her husband would defend her in any case better than we could, but Dawson would have it we should warn them, and so we turned towards the Court.  And now upon examination we found we had come very well out of this fight; for save that the wound in Dawson’s hand had been opened afresh, we were neither much the worse.