The tavern’s stable boy immediately began to remove the trunks into the main hallway. This overgrown, husky lad evidently did not share his employer’s disapproval of the guests, for he gazed in open-eyed wonder at the sisters, and then, with increasing awe, his glance strayed to the young girl. To his juvenile imagination an actress appeared in the glamour of a veritable goddess. But she had obviously that tender consideration for others which belongs to humanity, for she turned to the old man with an affectionate smile, removing from his shoulders the wet Petersham overcoat, and, placing it on a chair, regarded him with a look of filial anxiety. Yet their appearance belied the assumption of such relationship; he was hearty, florid and sturdy, of English type, while she seemed a daughter of the South, a figure more fitting for groves of orange and cypress, than for this rugged northern wilderness.

The emotion of the stable boy as he gazed at her, and the forbidding mood of the landlord were broken in upon by the tiny old lady, who, in a large voice, remarked:

“A haven at last! Are you the landlord?”

“Yes, ma’am,” testily replied that person.

“I am pleased to meet you, sir,” exclaimed the melancholy individual, as he extended a hand so cold and clammy that shivers ran up and down the back of the host when he took it gingerly. “We are having fine tragedy weather, sir!”

“A fire at once, landlord!” commanded the would-be beau.

“Refreshments will be in order!” exclaimed she of the trim ankles.

“And show me the best room in the house,” remarked her sister.

Mine host, bewildered by this shower of requests, stared from one to the other in helpless confusion, but finally collected his wits sufficiently to usher the company into the tap-room with:

“Here you’ll find a fire, but as for the best room, this gentleman”–indicating the reticent guest–“already occupies it.”

The young man at the fire, thus forced prominently into notice, arose slowly.

“You are mistaken, landlord,” he said curtly, hardly glancing at the players. “I no longer occupy it since these ladies have come.”

“Your complaisance does credit to your good nature, sir,” exclaimed the old man. “But we can not take advantage of it.”

“It is too good of you,” remarked the elder sister with a glance replete with more gratitude than the occasion demanded. “Really, though, we could not think of it.”

“Thank you; thank you,” joined in the wiry old lady, bobbing up and down like a miniature figure moved by the unseen hand of the showman. “Allow me, sir!” And she gravely tendered him a huge snuff-box of tortoise shell, which he declined; whereupon she continued:

“You do not use it? New fashions; new habits! Though whether for the better is not for me to say.”

She helped herself to a liberal portion and passed the box to the portly old gentleman. Here the landlord, in a surly tone, told the stable boy to remove the gentleman’s things and show the ladies to their rooms. Before going, the girl in the provoking hood–now unfastened, and freeing sundry rebellious brown curls where the moisture yet sparkled like dew–turned to the old man:

“You are coming up directly? Your stock wants changing, while your ruffles”–laughing–“are disgraceful!”

“Presently, my dear; presently!” he returned.

The members of the company mounted the broad stairway, save the driver of the coach–he of the disordered ruffles–who wiped his heavy boots on a door mat and made his way to the fire, where he stood in English fashion with his coat-tails under his arms, rubbing his hands and drying himself before the flames.

“A disagreeable time of year, sir,” he observed to the soldier, who had returned to his seat before the table. “Twice on the road we nearly broke down, and once the wagon dumped our properties in the ditch. Meanwhile, to make matters worse, the ladies heaped reproaches upon these gray hairs. This, sir, to the man who was considered one of the best whips in old Devonshire county.”

The other did not answer immediately, but regarded the speaker with the look of one not readily disposed to make acquaintances. His conclusions were apparently satisfactory, however, for he presently vouchsafed the remark:

“You are the manager, I presume?”

“I enjoy that honor,” returned the loquacious stranger. “But my duties are manifold. As driver of the chariot, I endure the constant apprehension of wrecking my company by the wayside. As assistant carpenter, when we can not find a stage it is my task to erect one. As bill-poster and license-procurer, treasurer and stage manager, my time is not so taken up, sir, as to preclude my going on and assuming a character.”

“A life of variety,” observed the young man, politely if indifferently.

“Yes; full of ups and downs, as the driver of the property wagon said when we entered this hilly district,” replied the manager, with the contentment of a man who has found a snug haven after a hard ride in a comparatively unbroken country. “Affluence we may know, but poverty is apt to be our companion.”

To this the other deemed no response necessary and a silence fell between them, broken only by the simmering water in the iron kettle, the sputtering of the sap in the burning logs and the creaking without of the long balancing pole that suspended the moss-covered bucket. The wind sighed in the chimney and the wooing flames sprang to meet it, while the heart of the fire glowed in a mass of coals between the andirons.

The old gentleman before the blaze began to outrival the kettle in steaming; from his coat-tails a thin veil of mist ascended, his face beaming through the vapor with benign felicity. Then he turned and toasted the other side and the kettle reigned supreme until he thawed once more and the clouds ascended, surrounding him like Jupiter on the celestial mount. At that the kettle hummed more angrily and the old gentleman’s face beamed with satisfaction.

“A snug company, sir,” he said, finally, glowing upon the impassive face before him, “like a tight ship, can weather a little bad weather. Perhaps you noticed our troupe? The old lady is Mrs. Adams. She is nearly seventy, but can dance a horn-pipe or a reel with the best of them. The two sisters are Kate and Susan Duran, both coquettes of the first water. Our juvenile man is a young Irishman who thinks much of his dress and little of the cultivation of mind and manners. Then,” added the old man tenderly, “there is my Constance.”

He paused abruptly. “Landlord, a pot of ale. My throat is hoarse from the mist. Fancy being for hours on a road not knowing where you are! Your good-fortune, sir!” Lifting the mug. “More than once we lurched like a cockle-shell.”

The conversation at this point was interrupted by the appearance of the juvenile man.

“Mr. Barnes, the ladies desire your company immediately.”

The manager hurriedly left the room and the newcomer regarded his retiring figure with a twinkle in his eye. Then he took a turn around the room in stilted fashion–like one who “carried about with him his pits, boxes and galleries”–and observed:

“Faith, Mr. Barnes’ couch is not a bed of roses. It is better to have the fair ones dangling after you, than to be running at their every beck and call.”

Here he twisted his mustache upward.

“A woman is a strange creature,” he resumed. “If she calls and you come once, your legs will be busy for the rest of your natural days.”

He seemed about to continue his observations along this philosophical line, when the manager appeared in much perturbation, approaching the landlord, who, at the same time, had entered the room from the kitchen.

“The ladies insist that their sheets are damp,” began the manager in his most plausible manner.

A dangerous light appeared in the other’s eyes.

“It’s the weather, you understand. Not your fault; bless you, no!”

The landlord’s face became a shade less acrimonious.

“Now, if there was a fire in the room–it is such a comfortable, cheery room–”

“Sandy!” interrupted the host, calling to the long-armed, red-handed stable boy, who thrust a shock of hair through the kitchen door. “Build a fire upstairs.”

Mr. Barnes heaved a sigh of relief and drawing a chair to the blaze prepared once more to enjoy a well-earned rest.

By this time the shadows had begun to lengthen in the room as the first traces of early twilight filled the valley. The gurgling still continued down the water pipe; the old sign before the front door moaned monotonously. An occasional gust of wind, which mysteriously penetrated the mist without sweeping it aside, rattled the windows and waved wildly in mid-air a venturesome rose which had clambered to the second story of the old inn. The barn-yard appeared even more dismal because of the coming darkness and the hens presented a pathetic picture of discomfort as they tucked their heads under their wet feathers for the night, while his lordship, the rooster, was but a sorry figure upon his high perch, with the moisture regularly and unceasingly dripping through the roof of the hen-house upon his unprotected back.

An aroma from the kitchen which penetrated the room seemed especially grateful to the manager who smiled with satisfaction as he conjured up visions of the forthcoming repast. By his Falstaffian girth, he appeared a man not averse to good living, nor one to deny himself plentiful libations of American home-brewed ale.

“Next to actual dining,” observed this past-master in the art, “are the anticipations of the table. The pleasure consists in speculation regarding this or that aroma, in classifying the viands and separating this combination of culinary odors into courses of which you will in due time partake. Alas for the poor stroller when the tavern ceases to be! Already it is almost extinct on account of the Erie Canal. Only a short time ago this room would have been crowded with teamsters of the broad-tired Pennsylvania wagons, drawn by six or eight horses.”

Again the appetizing aroma from the kitchen turned the current of his reflections into its original channel, for he concluded with: “An excellent dinner is in progress, if my diagnosis of these penetrating fragrances be correct.”

And it was soon demonstrated that the manager’s discernment was not in error. There was not only abundance but quality, and the landlord’s daughter waited on the guests, thereby subjecting herself to the very open advances of the Celtic Adonis. The large table was laden with heavy crockery, old-fashioned and quaint; an enormous rotary castor occupied the center of the table, while the forks and spoons were–an unusual circumstance!–of silver.

When the company had seated themselves around the board the waitress brought in a sucking pig, done to a turn, well stuffed, and with an apple in its mouth. The manager heaved a sigh.

“The lovely little monster,” said Kate, admiringly.

“Monster!” cried Susan. “Say cherub!”

“So young and tender for such a fate!” exclaimed Hawkes, the melancholy individual, with knife and fork held in mid-air.

“But worthy of the bearer of the dish!” remarked Adonis, so pointedly that the landlord’s daughter, overwhelmed with confusion, nearly dropped the platter, miniature porker and all. Whereupon Kate cast an angry glance at the offender whom “she could not abide,” yet regarded in a certain proprietary way, and Adonis henceforth became less open in his advances.

Those other aromas which the manager had mentally classified took form and substance and were arranged in tempting variety around the appetizing and well-browned suckling. There were boiled and baked hams, speckled with cloves, plates of doughnuts and pound cake, beet root and apple sauce. Before each of the guests stood a foaming mug of home-brewed ale that carried with it a palpable taste of the hops.

“There is nothing of the stage repast about this,” commented the manager.

To which Kate, having often partaken of the conventional banquet of the theater, waved her hand in a serio-comic manner toward the pièce de résistance and observed:

“Suppose, now, by some necromancy our young and tender friend here on the platter should be changed to a cleverly fashioned block of wood, painted in imitation of a roasted porker, with a wooden apple in his mouth?”

The manager, poising the carving knife, replied:

“Your suggestion is startling. We will obviate the possibility of any such transformation.”

And he cut the “ambrosian fat and lean” with a firm hand, eying the suckling steadfastly the while as if to preclude any exhibition of Hindoo mysticism, while the buxom lass, the daughter of the boniface, with round arms bared, bore sundry other dishes from place to place until the plates were heaped with an assortment of viands.

“Well, my dear, how are you getting on?” said the manager to the young actress, Constance, as he helped himself to the crackle. “Have you everything you want?”

She nodded brightly, and the stranger who was seated some distance from her glanced up; his gaze rested on her for a moment and then returned in cold contemplation to the fare set before him.

Yet was she worthy of more than passing scrutiny. The gleam of the lamp fell upon her well-turned figure and the glistening of her eyes could be seen in the shadow that rested on her brow beneath the crown of hair. She wore a dark lavender dress, striped with silk, a small “jacquette,” after the style of the day, the sleeves being finished with lace and the skirt full and flowing. Her heavy brown tresses were arranged in a coiffure in the fashion then prevailing, a portion of the hair falling in curls on the neck, the remainder brought forward in plaits and fastened at the top of the forehead with a simple pearl ornament.

If the young girl felt any interest in the presence of the taciturn guest she concealed it, scarcely looking at him and joining but rarely in the conversation. Susan, on the other hand, resorted to sundry coquetries.

“I fear, sir, that you find our poor company intrusive, since we have forced you to become one of us?” she said, toying with her fork, and thereby displaying a white and shapely hand.

His impassive blue eyes met her sparkling ones.

“I am honored in being admitted to your fellowship,” he returned perfunctorily.

“Only poor players, sir!” exclaimed Hawkes deprecatingly, with the regal gesture a stage monarch might use in setting forth the perplexities of royal pre-eminence.

“The landlord does not seem to share your opinion?” continued Susan, looking once more at the stranger.

“As a host he believes in brave deeds, not fair words,” said Kate, indicating the remains of the repast.

“Peace to his bones!” exclaimed the manager, extending a hand over the remnants of the suckling.

Here the dark-haired girl arose, the dinner being concluded. There was none of his usual brusqueness of manner, as the manager, leaning back in his chair and taking her hand, said:

“You are going to retire, my dear? That is right. We have had a hard day’s traveling.”

She bent her head, and her lips pressed softly the old man’s cheek, after which she turned from the rest of the company with a grave bow. But as she passed through the doorway her flowing gown caught upon a nail in the wall. Pre-occupied though he seemed, her low exclamation did not escape the ear of the stranger, and, quitting his place, he knelt at her feet, and she, with half turned head and figure gracefully poised, looked down upon him.

With awkward fingers, he released the dress, and she bowed her acknowledgment, which he returned with formal deference. Then she passed on and he raised his head, his glance following her through the bleak-looking hall, up the broad, ill-lighted staircase, into the mysterious shadows which prevailed above.

Shortly afterward the tired company dispersed, and the soldier also sought his room. There he found the landlord’s daughter before him with the warming-pan. She had spread open the sheets of his bed and was applying the old-fashioned contrivance for the prevention of rheumatism, but it was evident her mind was not on this commendable housewifely task, for she sighed softly and then observed:

“It must be lovely to be an actress!”

Dreamily she patted the pillows, until they were round and smooth, and absently adjusted the bed, until there was not a wrinkle in the snow-white counterpane, after which, like a good private in domestic service, she shouldered the warming pan with its long handle, murmured “good-night” and departed, not to dream of milking, churning or cheese-making, but of a balcony and of taking poison in a tomb.

Absently the stranger gazed at the books on the table: “Nutting’s Grammar,” “Adams’ Arithmetic,” “David’s Tears” and the “New England Primer and Catechism”–all useful books undoubtedly, but not calculated long to engross the attention of the traveler. Turning from these prosaic volumes, the occupant of the chamber drew aside the curtain of the window and looked out.

Now the mists were swept away; the stars were shining and the gurgling had grown fainter in the pipes that descended from the roof to the ground. Not far was the dark fringe which marked the forest and the liquid note of a whippoorwill arose out of the solitary depths, a melancholy tone in the stillness of the night. The little owl, too, was heard, his note now sounding like the filing of a saw and again changing in character to the tinkling of a bell. A dog howled for a moment in the barn-yard, and then, apparently satisfied with having given this evidence of watchfulness, re-entered his house of one room and curled himself upon the straw in his parlor, after which nothing more was heard from him.

Drawing the curtains of his own couch, a large, four-posted affair, sleep soon overpowered the stranger; but sleep, broken and fitful! Nor did he dream only of France and of kings running away, of American land barons and of “bolters.” More intrusive than these, the faces of the strollers crept in and disturbed his slumbers, not least among which were the features of the dark-eyed girl whose gown had caught as she passed through the doorway.