The Broad Highway by Jeffery Farnol — Read

And, in a little while, I rose, and buckled on my knapsack. The shadows were creeping on apace, but the sky was wonderfully clear, while, low down upon the horizon, I saw the full-orbed moon, very broad and big. It would be a brilliant night later, and this knowledge rejoiced me not a little. Before me stretched a succession of hills -- that chain of hills which, I believe, is called the Weald, and over which the dim road dipped, and wound, with, on either hand, a rolling country, dark with wood, and coppice -- full of mystery. The wind had quite fallen, but from the hedges came sudden rustlings and soft, unaccountable noises. Once, something small and dark scuttered across the road before me, and once a bird, hidden near by, set up a loud complaint, while, from the deeps of a neighboring wood, came the mournful note of a night-jar.

And, as I walked, I bethought me of poor Bill Nye, the Tinker. I could picture him tramping upon this very road, his jingling load upon his back, and the "loneliness" upon and around him. A small man, he would be, with a peaked face, little, round, twinkling eyes, grizzled hair, and a long, blue chin. How I came to know all this I cannot tell, only it seemed he must be so. On he went, his chin first upon one shoulder, and now upon the other, shooting furtive glances at hedges which were not hedges, and trees which were not trees. Somewhere there was a "thing" that looked like a big oak tree in the daytime -- a hollow oak. On he went through the shadows, on and on. Presently he turned out of the road, and there, sure enough, was the oak itself. Kneeling down, he slipped off his burden and pushed it through a jagged hole at the root. Then he glanced round him, a long, stealthy look, down at the earth and up at the sky, and crept into the tree. In the dimness I could see him fumble for the thing he wanted, pause to thumb its edge, and, throwing up his chin, raise his hand --