Coggan's waistcoat. It was Coggan's watch striking the hour of two.
Oak went to the recumbent form of Matthew Moon, who usually undertook the rough thatching of the homestead, and shook him. The shaking was without effect.
Gabriel shouted in his ear, "Where's your thatching-beetle and rick-stick and spars?"
"Under the staddles," said Moon mechanically, with the unconscious promptness of a medium.
Gabriel let go his head, and it dropped upon the floor like a bowl. He then went to Susan Tall's husband.
"Where's the key of the granary?"
No answer. The question was repeated, with the same result. To be shouted to at night was evidently less of a novelty to Susan Tall's husband than to Matthew Moon. Oak flung down Tall's head into the corner again and turned away.
To be just, the men were not greatly to blame for this painful and demoralizing termination to the evening's entertainment. Sergeant Troy had so strenuously insisted, glass in hand, that drinking should be the bond of their union, that those who wished to refuse hardly liked to be so unmannerly under the circumstances. Having from their youth up been entirely unaccustomed to any liquor stronger than cider or mild ale, it was no wonder
