We took the path winding upward through the wood to Crown Hill, the moon, now nearly full, shining intermittently through scudding clouds into our faces.
"I want to ask about the attempt made on your life the other evening," my companion said abruptly. "Oh!" she continued, "I know the tale about a thunderbolt is altogether false. You were struck down from behind, and left for dead. Your assailant cannot understand how it is you are alive, so he makes up a story as a defence for himself, perhaps, or, more probably, to provoke you to say something which may clear up what is mysterious to him. And you saw the design, and would not betray the secret."
"Oh dear, no! it is ordinary woman's wit, enlightened by the looks which passed between you and your enemy."
I granted that she had rightly discerned, but said nothing of what followed the knock-down blow.
"You are determined to keep secret the manner of your rescue?" she asked.
"Doubtless you have good reason. But there is another matter on which I wished to speak with you. Do you allow that there is such a virtue as prudence? If so, is it prudent to expose yourself to an enemy--a powerful, crafty, unscrupulous enemy?"
Then I burst out, "Do you bid me run away from him? Because----"
"Stay one moment," said she. "Surely prudent avoidance and cowardly flight are not the same thing."
"There is too much of a family likeness for me to distinguish between them," said I.
"So I feared," she answered. "What is the noise we hear?"
It was the noise of a crowd--hurrying feet, hoarse shouts. It came rapidly near. The mob was coming up the hill. Now I could hear distinctly "foreign witch," "Dutch devil," and other cries of a fouler kind. Unmistakably we were pursued. On the crest of the hill stood an old windmill, which might shelter us, and thither I hurried Mistress Goel. The door was padlocked, but one strong kick crashed it open. Pushing my companion inside, I took up the door, laid it across the entrance, dragged a few sacks of corn against it, and had a tolerable barricade; not a moment too soon, for the mob was upon us, with a yell of disappointed rage at sight of the obstacle in their way.
"Can you load a pistol?" I asked Mistress Goel.