“Pox the old villain!” fumed Mr. Meredith.  “For a six-months I’ve sat quiet, as ye know, and ’t is merely his way of paying the debts he owes me.  A fine state ye’ve brought the land to, when a man can settle private scores in such a manner.”

“There is n’t no denying that you ’re no friend to the cause, and if any one ’s to be took up hereabouts, it should be you.  Still, I’m a fair-play fellow, and so I thought, before I let him have his way, I’d come over and have a talk with you, to see if we could n’t fix things.”

“How?”

“If the king ’s come to his senses and intends to deal fair with us,” remarked Bagby, with a preliminary glance around and a precautionary dropping of his voice, “that ’s all I ask, and so I don’t see no reason for attacking his friends until we are more certain of what ’s coming.  At the same time, if Hennion wants to jail you, I think you’ll own I have n’t much reason to take your part.  You’ve always been as stuck up and abusive to me as you well could be.  So ’t is only natural I should n’t stand up for you.”

The lord of Greenwood swallowed before he said, “Perhaps I’ve not been neighbourly, but what sort of revenge is it to force me from my home, and distress my wife and daughter?”

“That’s it,” assented the Committeeman.  “And so I came over to see what could be done.  We have n’t been the best of friends down to now, but that is n’t saying that we could n’t have been, if you ’d been as far-seeing as me, and known who to side in with.  It seemed to me that if I stood by you in this scrape we might fix it up to act together.  I take it that my brains and your money could run Middlesex County about as we pleased, if we quit fighting, and work together.  Squire Hennion would have to take a back seat in politics, I guess.”

The squire could not wholly keep the pleasure the thought gave him from his face. “’T would be a god-send to the county,” he cried.  “Ye know that as well as I.”

“As to that, I’ll say nothing,” answered Joe.  “But of course, if I’m going to throw my influence with you, I expect something in return.”

“And what ’s that?” asked Mr. Meredith, still dwelling on his revenge.

“I need n’t tell you, squire, that I’m a rising man, and I’m going to go on rising.  ’T won’t be long before I’m about what I please, especially if we make a deal.  Now, though there has n’t been much intercourse between us, yet I’ve had my eye on your daughter for a long spell, and if you’ll give your consent to my keeping company with her, I’ll be your friend through thick and thin.”

For a moment Mr. Meredith stood with wide-open mouth, then he roared:  “Damn your impudence! ye—­ye—­have my lass, ye—­be off with ye—­ye—­” There all articulate speech ended, the speaker only sputtering in his wrath, but his two fists, shaken across the wall, spoke eloquently the words that choked him.

“I thought you ’d play the fool, as usual,” retorted the suitor, as he pulled his horse’s head around.  “You’ll live to regret this day, see if you don’t.”  And with this vague threat he trotted away toward Brunswick.