CHAPTER XIV FURTHER CONCERNING THE GENTLEMAN IN THE BATTERED HAT
"Sir," said my companion at last, lifting the battered hat, "I tender you my apology, and I shall be delighted to eat with you in the ditch, if you are in the same mind about it?"
"Then you believe me?"
"Indubitably, sir," he answered with a faint smile; "had you indeed been Sir Maurice, either he or I, and most probably I, would be lying flat in the road, by this."
So, without more ado, we sat down in the ditch together, side by side, and began to eat. And now I noticed that when he thought my eye was upon him, my companion ate with a due deliberation and nicety, and when he thought it was off, with a voracity that was painful to witness. And after we had eaten a while in silence, he turned to me with a sigh.
"This i
