"Vibart!"
The word had been uttered close behind me, and very softly, yet I
started at this sudden mention of my name and stood for a moment
with my hammer poised above the anvil ere I turned and faced the
speaker. He was a tall man with a stubbly growth of grizzled
hair about his lank jaws, and he was leaning in at that window of
the smithy which gave upon a certain grassy back lane.
"You spoke, I think!" said I.
"I said, 'Vibart'!"
"Well?"
"Well?"
"And why should you say 'Vibart'?"
"And why should you start?" Beneath the broad, flapping hat his
eyes glowed with a sudden intensity as he waited my answer.
"It is familiar," said I.
"Ha! familiar?" he repeated, and his features were suddenly
contorted as with a strong convulsion, and his teeth gleamed
between his pallid lips.
My hammer was yet in my grasp, and, as I met this baleful look,
my fingers tightened instinctively about the shaft.
"Familiar?" said he again.
"Yes," I nodded; "like your face, for it would almost seem that I
have seen you somewhere before, and I seldom forget faces."
"Nor do I!" said the man.
Now, while we thus fronted each other, there came the sound of
approaching footsteps, and John Pringle, the Carrier, appeared,
followed by the pessimistic Job.
"Marnin', Peter!--them 'orseshoes," began John, pausing just
outside the smithy door, "you was to finish 'em 's arternoon; if
so be as they bean't done, you bein' short'anded wi'out Jarge,
why, I can wait." Now, during this speech, I was aware that both
his and Job's eyes had wandered from my bandaged thumb to my bare
throat, and become fixed there.
"Come in and sit down," said I, nodding to each, as I blew up the
fire, "come in." For a moment they hesitated, then John stepped
gingerly into the smithy, closely followed by Job, and, watching
them beneath my brows as I stooped above the shaft of the
bellows, I saw each of them furtively cross his fingers.
"Why do you do that, John Pringle?" said I.
"Do what, Peter?"
"Cross your fingers."
"Why, ye see, Peter," said John, glancing in turn at the floor,
the rafters, the fire, and the anvil, but never at me, "ye see,
it be just a kind o' way o' mine."
"But why does Job do the same?"