‘There,’ said Evan, ‘I shall walk.  Good night.’  And he flung his cloak to step forward.

‘Stop a bit, sir!’ arrested him.

The postillion rallied up sideways, with an assumption of genial respect.  ‘I didn’t calc’late myself in that there amount.’

Were these words, think you, of a character to strike a young man hard on the breast, send the blood to his head, and set up in his heart a derisive chorus?  My gentleman could pay his money, and keep his footing gallantly; but to be asked for a penny beyond what he possessed; to be seen beggared, and to be claimed a debtor-aleck!  Pride was the one developed faculty of Evan’s nature.  The Fates who mould us, always work from the main-spring.  I will not say that the postillion stripped off the mask for him, at that instant completely; but he gave him the first true glimpse of his condition.  From the vague sense of being an impostor, Evan awoke to the clear fact that he was likewise a fool.

It was impossible for him to deny the man’s claim, and he would not have done it, if he could.  Acceding tacitly, he squeezed the ends of his purse in his pocket, and with a ‘Let me see,’ tried his waistcoat.  Not too impetuously; for he was careful of betraying the horrid emptiness till he was certain that the powers who wait on gentlemen had utterly forsaken him.  They had not.  He discovered a small coin, under ordinary circumstances not contemptible; but he did not stay to reflect, and was guilty of the error of offering it to the postillion.

The latter peered at it in the centre of his palm; gazed queerly in the gentleman’s face, and then lifting the spit of silver for the disdain of his mistress, the moon, he drew a long breath of regret at the original mistake he had committed, and said: 

‘That’s what you’re goin’ to give me for my night’s work?’

The powers who wait on gentlemen had only helped the pretending youth to try him.  A rejection of the demand would have been infinitely wiser and better than this paltry compromise.  The postillion would have fought it:  he would not have despised his fare.

How much it cost the poor pretender to reply, ’It ’s the last farthing I have, my man,’ the postillion could not know.

‘A scabby sixpence?’ The postillion continued his question.

‘You heard what I said,’ Evan remarked.

The postillion drew another deep breath, and holding out the coin at arm’s length: 

‘Well, sir!’ he observed, as one whom mental conflict has brought to the philosophy of the case, ‘now, was we to change places, I couldn’t a’ done it!  I couldn’t a’ done it!’ he reiterated, pausing emphatically.

‘Take it, sir!’ he magnanimously resumed; ’take it!  You rides when you can, and you walks when you must.  Lord forbid I should rob such a gentleman as you!’

One who feels a death, is for the hour lifted above the satire of postillions.  A good genius prompted Evan to avoid the silly squabble that might have ensued and made him ridiculous.  He took the money, quietly saying, ‘Thank you.’