The next morning marked the beginning of the sixth day of their journey, and Humphrey rose with unimpaired cheerfulness. Once more Hugo"s waking eyes beheld two peewits spitted over the coals and a meal cake baking in the embers. "I did dream of gold last night," said Humphrey, by way of a morning greeting. "Knowest thou what that betokeneth?"
"Nay," responded Hugo, pleasantly.
"It betokeneth success in thy present undertaking after first meeting with difficulties. We have met with difficulties, and what were they but the king"s men? They be now behind us, and success is to be ours.
But come thou to breakfast now. To-morrow morn we set forth again."
CHAPTER IX
On this, their last day in the Isle of Axholme, Hugo and Humphrey took up the occupation of the day before, but with more deliberation. And they went in a different direction,--southeast, toward the Trent.
"It is this way we journey on the morrow with the horses," remarked Humphrey. "It is as well to see what the way is like while we gather our store of reeds and rushes. For I did dream of gold, which betokeneth success in our present undertaking, and success ever resteth on good care and good judgment. And so let us see where the solid places be and where the bogs lie. And do thou note well the course so that we may run it with safety and speed if need be. And we will not gather the reeds and rushes till we return."
"Meanest thou to walk to the Trent, then, to-day, and back again?"
questioned Hugo. And by this time he had so far forgotten the difference in their stations that there was respect in his tone, which Humphrey was quick to notice.
"Yea, lad," answered the serving-man, kindly. "It is only a few miles.
It is not well to risk miring the horses when I did dream of gold last night."
Hugo smiled. He was beginning to see that, while the superst.i.tion of the age, and particularly of his condition, had, to a certain extent, a hold on Humphrey, his course was really directed by st.u.r.dy common-sense; and he wondered no more at Lady De Aldithely"s trust in him.
The two were well on their way, and Richard Wood and his men-at-arms were scouring the forest near Doncaster, when Walter Skinner walked out to the stables of the Green Dragon to see to his horse. His face was still painful, and he desired to vent some of his spleen on the unlucky groom, whoever he might be, who had his horse in charge. He found the horse tied to a ring in the stable wall, and the groom having a sorry time of it, since every time the groom touched him with comb or brush the animal backed, or turned, or laid back his ears and snapped with his teeth. For the monks at the priory had furnished the king"s man, on his compulsion, with the worst horse in their stables.
"Here be a beast fit for the Evil One and for n.o.body else," grumbled the sorely tried groom. "I am like to be killed for my pains in trying to smooth his coat for him."
The groom was a tall, overgrown fellow of nineteen, with a vacant face and an ever-running tongue. He now stood stock still upon the approach of Walter Skinner and gazed at him. He would have done the same if any creature possessed of the power of locomotion had come into his view.
But of that Walter Skinner was ignorant. To him the gaze of the groom seemed honor and respect toward himself, and even, perhaps, awe. And he was at once mollified.
"My horse is a beast of mettle," he observed complacently when the groom had returned to his work.
"Ay, and I would that his master, the Evil One, had the grooming of him," was the retort.
"Why, how now, sirrah! Dost thou slander the horse which is a gift from Mother Church to the king"s work? Thou art a knave, and no doubt art but unfit for thy task this morn through over-late carousing last night."
"Thou mayest call it carousing, if thou wilt," said the groom, sulkily.
"I did come from Gainsborough yesterday. And in the dark, as I did come, I saw a flaming fire in the Isle of Axholme."
"And what meanest thou to tell me of that?" demanded Walter Skinner, sternly. "Thou wert no doubt so drunk that a will-o"-the-wisp in that boggy place did seem to thee even as a flaming fire. Why dost thou not stand to my horse and get down with him? He hath already backed and turned a matter of some miles."
The groom stopped and looked at him indignantly. "I may be but a groom," he said, "but the Isle of Axholme I know from a child, every bog in it. And I did go to the fire, which was a bit out of my way, but, being my only pleasure on the journey, I did take it. And there on the rushes lay a young lord, and his serving-man did feed the fire with reeds."
"Thou didst see that?" cried Walter Skinner, in great excitement. "Make haste with the beast, sirrah. Here is a coin for thee, good groom. I do now see thou wert never drunken in thy life. Make haste with the horse."
The groom stared at him foolishly. "Why, who could make haste with such a beast?" he said at length.
"Then stay not to finish thy work," cried Walter Skinner, impatiently.
"Bring saddle and bridle. I must away instantly. But do thou first describe to me the place where thou didst see the fire."
"The place," said the groom, deliberately, while he examined the coin Walter Skinner had given him. "Thou dost go till thou comest to it. A turn here and a turn there mayhap thou must make, and thou wilt find it a little solid place with three scrub trees upon it. It is a matter of a short distance from the south end of the Isle, and thou wilt not fail to know it when thou seest it."
With this not over-clear direction Walter Skinner was obliged to be content. Bidding the groom to bring the horse to the door of the inn at once, he hurried away, paid his reckoning, examined carefully the string of his bow, and looked over his store of arrows. "And now, Josceline, son of Lord De Aldithely," he said, "my arrow will bid thee halt this time, and not my voice. And thou, Richard Wood, who didst say, "We hunt no more in company," what wouldst thou give to know of this place in the Isle of Axholme? And thou mayst have thy men-at-arms to bear thee company, and to pay for when thou art done with them. They cost thee more than a bow and some arrows cost me, nor will they do thee one half the good."
So thinking he bestrode the vicious beast which backed and plunged about the inn yard, and from which the grooms and the watching maids fled in all directions. Walter Skinner, however, was not to be unseated, and, the horse being headed in the right direction, his next plunge carried him out of the yard and fairly started him on his way, the spur of his rider giving him no permission to halt for a moment.
"And now," thought Walter Skinner, when he had crossed the Don and was free of the town, "what said the knave groom? I must go till I come to it. Ay, and who knoweth when that shall be, and who knoweth the way in this pitfall of bogs? Three scrub trees, saith he, and all together on one little solid place. I would I might see three little scrub trees."
His horse had been over the Isle before and, being given his head, began to pick his way so cleverly that Walter Skinner was still further elated. He sat up pompously and pictured himself a courtier at the palace as a reward for this day"s work. "For I lean not to golden rewards alone," he said. "No doubt it can be managed that from this day I begin to rise. The king hath advanced baser men than I, let Richard Wood think as he will in the matter."
And now he descried the three little scrub trees; but he saw not the horses, they having been taken to another islet for pasture; nor Fleetfoot, who had gone with Hugo and Humphrey.
"The knave groom spake true," said Walter Skinner, with satisfaction.
"There be the rushes on which they lie, and there the ashes of the fire. I will seek out a convenient hiding-place in the reeds, and to-night, when the fire blazeth bright, then shall my arrows sing."
So saying he sought a place of concealment for himself and his horse, and, having found it, and tied the horse securely, he lay down well satisfied.
Hugo and Humphrey did not return till toward evening. They had caught some fish in the Trent and roasted them on the coals for their dinner, and afterward had come leisurely back, enjoying the scenes and sights of the marsh.
From his covert Walter Skinner saw them come, each leading a horse which he had stopped to get from the islet pasture, while Fleetfoot lagged behind on a little hunting expedition of his own. The spy drew his bow and sighted. "Yea," he said to himself, "no doubt I can do it.
And what is an arrow wound more or less when one would win the favor of the king? The lad or his servant may die of it. But what is death? It is e"en what every man sooner or later must meet. And it is the king"s favor I will have, come what may to these runaways." Then he laid down the bow and arrow and took a long drink from his horn. "When the flames shoot high and they be in the strong light of the blaze, then will I shoot," he said. "And it is their own fault if they be hit. They should have remained in the castle where Robert Sadler arriveth this same night."
Hugo and Humphrey had not before been on such thoroughly amicable terms as they were to-night. The boy, so much like his young master, had, unconsciously to Humphrey, won his way into the heart of the serving-man; while Hugo had learned in their few days" companionship to feel toward Humphrey as his faithfulness deserved. So, while the fire blazed up and all remained in darkness outside of its circle, Humphrey entertained Hugo with tales of his early life, to which the boy listened with appreciation. "Ay, lad," said Humphrey, when half an hour had gone by and he paused in his story to look at him with approval, "thou hast the ears of my lady herself, who is ever ready to listen to what I would say."
And then came a whistling arrow, shot by an unsteady, drunken hand, and another, and another, none of which wounded either boy or man, since Hugo was still defended by his shirt of mail, and Humphrey wore a stout gambeson.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Humphrey started up, s.n.a.t.c.hing a great bunch of long flaming reeds]
Instantly Humphrey started up and, s.n.a.t.c.hing a great bunch of long, flaming reeds to serve him for a light, ran in the direction whence the arrows had come. Hugo, catching up an armful of reeds yet unlighted to serve when those Humphrey carried should burn out, hurried after him.
Soon they had found the covert and the spy, and, tossing his torch to Hugo, the serving-man rushed at him.
"And wouldst thou slay my dear lad?" he cried. "Thou snipe!"
"Stand back!" sputtered the spy. "Lay not thy hands upon me. I serve the king."
"Ay, and thou shalt find what it is to serve the king," cried Humphrey, seizing him by the shoulders and dragging him along. "Yon is his horse," he said, turning to Hugo. "Cut him loose."
The boy obeyed and, with a snort, the animal was off.
"Thou shalt be well punished for this deed," threatened the spy. "The steed was the gift of the prior of St. Edmund"s."
"Talk not of punishment," cried the enraged Humphrey; "thou who wouldst slay my dear lad. Lead to the right, lad!" he cried. "I do know a miry pool. It will not suck him down, but it will cause him some labor to get out of it."
Hugo, bearing the torch, obeyed, and shortly they had reached the pool which Humphrey had discovered the day before. Grasping his shoulders yet more firmly, and fairly lifting the little spy from his feet, the stalwart Humphrey set him down with a thud in the sticky mud. "There thou mayest stand like a reed or a rush," he said. "I would thou wert as worthy as either."
A moment the spy stood there in water up to his knees while Hugo and Humphrey, by the light of the ever-renewed torch of reeds, watched him.
Then he began to try to extricate himself. But when he pulled one foot loose, it was only to set the other more securely in the mud.