"They do, do they, sirrah! Then they will call me bread and no dripping to-morrow!" and old Salterne, entering from behind, made a dash at the poor fellow's ears: but luckily thought better of it, having a couple of bottles in each hand.
"My dear sir," said Amyas, "you don't mean us to drink all that wine?"
"Why not, sir?" answered Salterne, in a grim, half-sneering tone, thrusting out his square-grizzled beard and chin. "Why not, sir? why should I not make merry when I have the honor of a noble captain in my house? one who has sailed the seas, sir, and cut Spaniards' throats; and may cut them again too; eh, sir! Boy, where's the kettle and the sugar?"
"What on earth is the man at?" quoth Amyas to himself—"flattering me, or laughing at me?"
"Yes," he ran on, half to himself, in a deliberate tone, evidently intending to hint more than he said, as he began brewing the sack—in plain English, hot negus; "Yes, bread and dripping for those who can't fight Spaniards; but the best that money can buy for those who can. I heard of you at Smerwick, sirYes, bread and dripping for me too—I can't fight Spaniards: but for such as you. Look here, sir; I should like to feed a crew of such up, as you'd feed a main of fighting-cocks, and then start them with a pair of Sheffield spurs a-piece—you've a good one there to your side, sir: but don't you think a man might carry two now, and fight as they say those Chineses do, a sword to each hand? You could kill more that way, Captain Leigh, I reckon?"
Amyas half laughed.
"One will do, Mr. Salterne, if one is quick enough with it."
"Humph!—Ah—No use being in a hurry. I haven't been in a hurry. No—I waited for you; and here you are and welcome, sir! Here comes supper: a light matter, sir, you see. A capon and a brace of partridges. I had no time to feast you as you deserve."
And so he ran on all supper-time, hardly allowing Amyas to get a word in edge ways: but heaping him with coarse flattery, and urging him to drink, till after the cloth was drawn, and the two left alone, he grew so outrageous that Amyas was forced to take him to task good humoredly.
"Now, my dear sir, you have feasted me royally, and better far than I deserve: but why will you go about to make me drunk twice over, first with vainglory and then with wine?"
Salterne looked at him a while fixedly, and then, sticking out his chin—"Because, Captain Leigh, I am a man who has all his life tried the crooked road first, and found the straight one the safer after all."
"Eh, sir! That is a strange speech for one who bears the character of the most upright man in Bideford."
"Humph. So I thought myself once, sir; and well I have proved it. But I'll be plain with you, sir. You've heard how—how I've fared since you saw me last?"
