"Let me go, Truelove!" he commanded.

"If I am a Friend, I am a man as well! Thou fellow with the shoulder knots, thee shall pay dearly for thy insolence!" Truelove tightened her hold.

"Ephraim, Ephraim! If a man compel thee to go with him a mile, thee is to go with him twain; if he take thy cloak, thee is to give him thy coat also; if he--Ah!" She buried her profaned cheek in her arm and began to cry, but very softly.
Her tormentors, flushed with wine and sworn to obtain each one a kiss, laughed more loudly, and one young rake, with wig and ruffles awry, lurched forward to take the place of the coxcomb who had scored.

Ephraim wrenched himself free, and making for this gentleman might have given or received bodily injury, had not a heavy hand falling upon his shoulder stopped him in mid-career.
"Stand aside, boy," said MacLean, "This quarrel's mine by virtue of my making it so.

Mistress Truelove, you shall have no further annoyance.