"I beg your pardon," called Ned, interrupting the flow of wrath, "but we have lost our way, and being drenched through, want to know----"
"Well, I never!" came the voice, its owner grasping the situation at once. "Here, Adam, man, take the light an' show the gentle folk across the ford, an' I'll just run back and see to things."
Five minutes later, escorted by an apple-cheeked man of about fifty, they were entering a cottage where the fire had evidently been newly brushed up, a kettle put on, and a few hurried touches added to already existing tidiness by an apple-faced woman forty or thereabouts.
She bobbed them a truly primeval curtsey.
"Dear sakes, gentlemen, you must be through to your vests. Adam, set a cheer for the gentle folks, man. Adam and me was just after the hi'fer, sir, she's down calvin', an' they lays like lead on me till it's over, that they do. An' Adam is such a heavy sleeper, but there! Two of a sort can't live together, no, they can't."
This calm, philosophic treatment of him, brought a half-conscious giggle from Adam, and she passed on to treat of other subjects in like manner. "The village, h'm, not much of a place for _sleepin'_ in, an' a good mile anyhow, with the bridge locked. Better a hayloft _to yourself_ than some of them cottages. As for supper, they wouldn't get nothin' fit for gentle folk to eat. She could see what she'd got, an' meanwhile Adam'd show them the loft, and bring 'em over pillows an' blankets; they'd dry easy in the hay, while the clothes hung 'andy on the rafters, or Adam could bring 'em back to the fire when he tuk over supper, not but what it _was_ perhaps better to 'ave somethin' to put on in case o' fire!"
A quarter of an hour afterwards, having made a most excellent meal of cold beefsteak pie and tea, which, they were assured, was "better to keep a chill off than beer," they duly put out the lantern, with which they had been bidden "to be real careful because of the yay," and listened to the clear, dispassionate voice saying, as its owner passed the loft--
"You go ter yer bed, Adam, an' sleep while you can. She's passed midnight, and it wunt come now till dawn; but I ain't the mind to sleep. They lies too heavy, poor dears."