a jail, with its mangy crowd of drunken, quarrelsome and
song-singing rapscallions. But the thing that made sleep all the more a thing
not to be dreamed of, was my racking impatience to get out of this place and
find out the whole size of what might have happened yonder in the slave quarters
in consequence of that intolerable miscarriage of mine.
    It was a long night, but the morning got around at last. I made a full and
frank explanation to the court. I said I was a slave, the property of the great
Earl Grip, who had arrived just after dark at the Tabard inn in the village on
the other side of the water, and had stopped there over night, by compulsion, he
being taken deadly sick with a strange and sudden disorder. I had been ordered
to cross to the city in all haste and bring the best physician; I was doing my
best; naturally I was running with all my might; the night was dark, I ran
against this common person here, who seized me by the throat and began to pummel
me, although I told him my errand, and implored him, for the sake of the great
earl my master's mortal peril -
    The common person interrupted and said it was a lie; and was going to
explain how I rushed upon him and attacked him without a word -
    »Silence, sirrah!« from the court. »Take him hence and give him a few
stripes whereby to teach him how to treat the servant of a nobleman after a
different fashion another time. Go!«
    Then the court begged my pardon, and hoped I would not fail to tell his
lordship it was in no wise the court's fault that this highhanded thing had
happened. I said I would make it all right, and so took my leave. Took it just
in time, too; he was starting to ask me why I didn't fetch out these facts the
moment I was arrested. I said I would if I had thought of it - which was true -
but that I was so battered by that man that all my wit was knocked out of me -
and so forth and so-on, and got myself away, still mumbling.
    I didn't wait for breakfast. No grass grew under my feet. I was soon at the
slave quarters. Empty - everybody gone! That is, everybody except one body - the
slave-master's. It lay there all battered to pulp; and all about were the
evidences of a terrific fight. There was a rude board