"Bob tell me: how was it that we were found out?"
"Well, you see, Miss--Ma'am--when you were at Dunville, where you was
said to have staid all night, there was a fellow there who had a habit
for which he ought to be hung--of looking through the key-holes and
watching ladies when they thought themselves unseen. And this fellow saw
you take off your red wig."
"And so discovered and denounced me?"
"No, he didn't, Ma'am; he didn't even suspect who you was. He took you
for a circus woman. And as for reporting what he had seen to anybody in
that house, it would have been as much as his life was worth. Old
Colonel Purley--he's a uncle of our bailiff--old Colonel Purley would
have peeled the skin offen his body, if he had a-known he had done such
a mean thing in his tavern."
"Then how--"
"I'll tell you, Ma'am. It was this way. That fellow which, his name was
Batkin, was on his way to Blackville. And all along the road he kept
telling the yarn about the beautiful black-haired young lady he had
seen, and who had disfigured herself by wearing of a red wig; and of
course he raised suspicions there. And when he was questioned farther,
he described the wagon and horses, and the man and the woman, so
accurately that the authorities thought it worth while to take the
description down; and old Purley has it in his pocket along with the
warrant. And then, as I told you, the bailiffs all resigned rather than
go after you; and old Purley had to be appointed. And I applied, and got
appointed too, only to help you!"
"Heaven reward you for the kind thought! But, Bob, there were some of
the old set found who were willing to take me; for they went to
Annapolis after me, armed with warrant for my arrest."
"Yes; them two: Smith and Jones! Sink 'em! I've swore a oath to thrash
'em both within an inch of their lives the first time I set eyes on
them! Well, they didn't find you, Satan burn 'em! that's one comfort."
"How was it that you found us?"
"Oh, Miss Sybil--Mrs. Berners, I should say--we did it easy when we once
had got the clue. We went first to Dunville to inquire after the
gray-bearded man and his red-headed daughter, and we learned the road
you had taken, and followed you from stage to stage until we got to
Norfolk. There we inquired in the neighborhood of the market, and found
where you had put up. Then, at the 'Farmers' Hotel,' we were told, you
had left for home that afternoon. Of course we knew that was a ruse.
We knew that if you had left, it was for the deck of some outward bound
ship. So we inquired, and found out that the Enterprise was to sail in
the morning. And we staid at this house all night, and boarded the ship
this morning as you saw."