Robert was seen riding out, and the tramp of his horse was heard as he returned homeward.  He called no more at the Pilot.  Darkness and mystery enveloped him.  There were nightly meetings under Mrs. Boulby’s roof, in the belief that he could not withstand her temptations; nor did she imprudently discourage them; but the woman at last overcame the landlady within her, and she wailed:  “He won’t come because of the drink.  Oh! why was I made to sell liquor, which he says sends him to the devil, poor blessed boy? and I can’t help begging him to take one little drop.  I did, the first night he was down, forgetting his ways; he looked so desperate, he did, and it went on and went on, till he was primed, and me proud to see him get out of his misery.  And now he hates the thought of me.”

In her despair she encouraged Sedgett to visit her bar and parlour, and he became everywhere a most important man.

Farmer Eccles’s habits of seclusion (his pride, some said), and more especially the dreaded austere Aunt Anne, who ruled that household, kept people distant from the Warbeach farm-house, all excepting Sedgett, who related that every night on his return, she read a chapter from the Bible to Robert, sitting up for him patiently to fulfil her duty; and that the farmer’s words to his son had been:  “Rest here; eat and drink, and ride my horse; but not a penny of my money do you have.”

By the help of Steeve Bilton, the Fairly huntsman, Sedgett was enabled to relate that there was a combination of the gentlemen against Robert, whose behaviour none could absolutely approve, save the landlady and jolly Butcher Billing, who stuck to him with a hearty blind faith.

“Did he ever,” asked the latter, “did Bob Eccles ever conduct himself disrespectful to his superiors?  Wasn’t he always found out at his wildest for to be right—­to a sensible man’s way of thinking?—­though not, I grant ye, to his own interests—­there’s another tale.”  And Mr. Billing’s staunch adherence to the hero of the village was cried out to his credit when Sedgett stated, on Stephen Bilton’s authority, that Robert’s errand was the defence of a girl who had been wronged, and whose whereabout, that she might be restored to her parents, was all he wanted to know.  This story passed from mouth to mouth, receiving much ornament in the passage.  The girl in question became a lady; for it is required of a mere common girl that she should display remarkable character before she can be accepted as the fitting companion of a popular hero.  She became a young lady of fortune, in love with Robert, and concealed by the artifice of the offending gentleman whom Robert had challenged.  Sedgett told this for truth, being instigated to boldness of invention by pertinacious inquiries, and the dignified sense which the whole story hung upon him.

Mrs. Boulby, who, as a towering woman, despised Sedgett’s weak frame, had been willing to listen till she perceived him to be but a man of fiction, and then she gave him a flat contradiction, having no esteem for his custom.