There was no difficulty in finding the warrants. With these, and the hundred guineas he had lost, safe in his pocket, John Garnet turned Katerfelto's head towards the down, pausing one moment to thank the gipsies for their timely aid, and impress on them the necessity of mercy towards their captives. In that moment Waif's hand clasped his own, and Waif's voice murmured in his ear:
"My tribe have done you good service, leave the rest to me. I do not say farewell, for it would break my heart to think we should not meet again!"
It is only fair to state that Lord Bellinger writhed and struggled with a vigour not to have been expected from his attenuated frame, much to the delight of his captors, who were inclined to treat him more leniently than if he had submitted, like his footman, without show of resistance. This champion they kicked and belaboured to some purpose, while they pinioned his fellow-servant, from whose readier hands they had wrested the harmless blunderbuss, and threatened him in frightful language if he ventured to stir a finger. To my lady, though insisting that she should retain her seat in the carriage, they behaved with extreme politeness. She was afterwards heard, indeed, to protest that the robber-chief, as she called Fin Cooper, seemed a perfect gentleman; that he had a distinguished air, and for a black man--though, in a general way, she could not abide black men (Lord Bellinger being as black as a crow)--was by no means ill-looking.
Mistress Rachel, too, while frightened and hysterical, as behoved her station, clung persistently to the arm of a stout gipsy, who mounted guard over her person, entreating him, in piteous terms, to respect her youth, and, above all, to protect her from the insults of his comrades; lavishing on him tender glances, and contrasting his assured demeanour with the cowardice of her late admirer, whose very teeth chattered for dismay. My lord, in the meantime, with a swarthy fellow at each limb, lay helpless on his back, cursing volubly, but losing neither presence of mind nor temper. Indeed, when he had sufficiently relieved his feelings by such ebullitions, and perceived that no violence was offered to Lady Bellinger or her maid, the situation seemed to strike him as ludicrous, and, bursting into a laugh, he called on the gipsies to release him, promising, on his honour, that no further resistance should be offered by himself, or his servants, to the continuation of their frolic.