The tread of the horse approaching had become a gallop as the light improved, and horse and horseman were soon visible. Paul Davies stood erect, and took up a position a few steps in advance of the blighted tree at whose foot he had been stretched. The figure, seen against the dusky glare of the moon, would have answered well enough for one of those highwaymen who in old times made the heath famous. His low-crowned felt hat, his short coat with a cape to it, and the leather casings, which looked like jack-boots, gave this horseman, seen in dark outline against the glow, a character not unpicturesque. With a sudden strain of the bridle, the gaunt rider pulled up before the man who awaited him.
"What are you doing there?" said the horseman roughly.
Thus the signs and countersigns were exchanged, and the stranger said--
"No company but ourselves, mate," answered Davies.
"You're up to half a dozen dodges, Paul, and knows how to lime a twig; that's your little game, you know. This here tree is clean enough, but that 'ere has a hatful o' leaves on it."
"I didn't put them there," said Paul, a little sulkily.
"Well, no. I do suppose a sight o' you wouldn't exactly put a tree in leaf, or a rose-bush in blossom; nor even make wegitables grow. More like to blast 'em, like that rum un over your head."
"Jest this--there's leaves enough for a bird to roost there, so this won't do. Now, then, move on you with me."
As the gaunt rider thus spoke, his long red beard was blowing this way and that in the breeze; and he turned his horse, and walked him towards that lonely tree in which, as he lay gazing on its black outline, Paul had fancied the shape of a phantom policeman.
"I don't care a cuss," said Davies. "I'm half sorry I came a leg to meet yer."
"I wish you was as cold as me, and you'd growl a bit, maybe, yourself," said Paul. "I'm jolly cold."
"Why didn't ye fetch a line o' the old author with you?" asked the rider--meaning brandy.
"Who'd a-guessed we was to have a night like this in summer-time?"
"I do believe it freezes all the year round in this queer place."
"Would ye like a drop of the South-Sea mountain (gin)?" said the stranger, producing a flask from his pocket, which Paul Davies took with a great deal of good-will, much to the donor's content, for he wished to find that gentleman in good-humour in the conversation that was to follow.