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from the man’s companions.
    “Beaumont, out!” said Ingram.
    “All right, all right.” Beaumont took up his saddlebag, threw it over his shoulder, paused to empty his cup, walked past the enraged audience with an amicable nod, and followed Ingram into the yard.
    Ingram grabbed his sleeve. “We’d better run, or they’ll make quick work of us.”
    “No, no – he was the only one who wanted to pick a fight,” said Beaumont, moving at an unhurried pace.
    “Beaumont,” Ingram said anxiously, “if you’ll allow me, I’d like to give you a piece of advice. Things aren’t what they were over here. Tempers have grown very hot, and it would serve you to be more careful. He was armed, for God’s sake.”
    “Well thank you for that piece of advice, Ingram, but so was I.” Beaumont showed him a pair of pistols tucked into his saddlebag.
    Ingram eyed them, feeling still more anxious: he had never shot a man, nor seen a man shot. “Good that it went no further. It might have if he’d seen them, or if you’d been wearing a sword.”
    “That’s exactly why I kept them hidden, and why I left my sword behind where I stabled my horse. I’ve no desire to fight anyone at all,” Beaumont said, with an air of outraged innocence.
    “You broke his nose!”
    “Purely in self-defence.”
    Ingram started to laugh. “And we didn’t even pay for that last round.”
    “That’s unforgivable. Should we go back?”
    “Certainly not. I should be off to bed.”
    “Is someone waiting there for you?” Beaumont asked slyly.
    “I wish!” said Ingram, still laughing.
    They had arrived at a churchyard. Beaumont pushed him through the gate, and they sat down on the grass. After hunting about in his saddlebag, Beaumont produced a flask. He offered it to Ingram, who had a swig of the contents.
    “That would put hair on anyone’s chest!” he spluttered, as the fierce liquor burnt its way down his insides.
    “Not on mine,” said Beaumont, taking back the flask.
    “Still smooth as a baby’s bum, is it? Well, at least you have plenty on your scalp.” Ingram chuckled. “Remember when we were up at Merton, how we had a bet as to who would start shaving first?”
    “Which you won.”
    “And now I’m paying for it! Kate’s always after me with one thing or another that she promises will restore my locks to their former glory.”
    “How is your sister, by the way?” Beaumont asked, stretching out his long legs.
    “Very well. She’s getting married next month, to Sir Bernard Radcliff.”
    “Radcliff? Ah – your excellent soldier.”
    “One of the best men I’ve ever met.” Ingram paused to stifle a belch. “Thank heaven she had the sense to accept him. We were at the end of our tether trying to find a match for her. She’s not so young any more. Twenty-two on her last birthday.”
    Beaumont made a shocked sound through his teeth. “Ancient! What about him?”
    “He’s somewhat older than she is, I grant you, but he’s never been married. He fell madly in love with her. He came all the way back from service in Holland just to make his proposal. Wasn’t even bothered that she had such a small dowry,” Ingram added, stifling another belch.
    “Then how
could
she refuse him! What about you, Ingram, have you thought of marrying again?” Beaumont inquired, more gently.
    Ingram recalled his wife as he had last seen her, in death, her face ruined from the smallpox and her jaw tied up with a band of linen so that it would not fall open. It upset him that eight years later he remembered so little of her when she was alive. “I did consider it once,” he said, “but I couldn’t bring myself to speak to the woman. I’ve no property, and no great prospects, and now, with the war …”
    “Oh yes, the war.”
    Emboldened by alcohol, Ingram ventured, “Your family were at their wits’ end, not hearing from you all this time, apart from a couple of brief letters you sent. I’d like to see their faces when you appear at