thought Billy. "I'd 'a took her for Lizzie in a minute. An' who's him? An' who'd 'a thought it? I wonder what the henchbeck and her daughter's bin doin' with their time?"
They came closer, hip to hip, the girl walking haltingly and awkwardly, as girls do when held tightly in such a position. They paused nearly opposite Billy's eyes in the grass, and the man seemed trying to draw the girl aside to the shadow of the opposite hedge, where there was a gate—and some words were spoken. Then Billy was out and at him, and Lizzie, in her new hat, walking rapidly towards "Chawlton." She had dropped the cardboard box as if it were nothing in particular—a holly spray, perhaps.
There was another man in the ditch who crept and ran along the bottom of it. The taller of the two went down, of course, in the unexpectedness of the attack. He got up, threw out his hands blindly and went down again; he was slow this time and started to get up "gropin' like," the watcher said, "when the little 'un laid 'olt on 'im, tryin' to lift 'im an' workin' an' bustin' hisself like a loon- antic."
No doubt Bob was stricken and handicapped with the swift consciousness of his own guiltiness, and it flashed through his mind, at the first blow, that it was vengeance and not footpads that had him.
"God forgive Billy? Get up, you——? Get up, you——? God forgive ——. Are you hurt, you —— ——? Are you hurt, you —— ——? Say it—or—I'll—I'll ——" Bob said "No." A "naw" was sorter jerked out on 'im, the watcher said.
