Nearer and nearer drew the hors.e.m.e.n until, in the vale just opposite and below Hugo and Humphrey, they dismounted. "Here do we stop," said Walter Skinner. "I warrant you they be hereabouts, else have the fat priests lied when they denied they were in abbey and priory."
"Ay," answered one of the men-at-arms. "They be hereabouts, no doubt, if they be not farther to the east, when thy fellow will catch them if we miss them. I marvel thou hast not come up with them before now. Thou sayest this is the third day of their flight?"
This seeming to reflect on the ability of the pompous little Walter Skinner, he frowned. And drawing himself up importantly he said, "The young lord hath to his servant a Saxon who knoweth well these parts."
"Some deer-stealer, without doubt," observed the man-at-arms.
"And he goeth not straight forward," continued Walter Skinner, "else had I met him. But he creepeth here, and hideth there, and goeth in retired paths."
"And all to balk thee!" said the big man-at-arms, regarding with scarce concealed contempt the little strutting spy.
There was that in the manner of the man-at-arms that nettled Walter Skinner, so that he became more pompous than before and, resolved to show the soldier how high he stood in the king"s counsel, he said haughtily: "Why, it were best he balk me, if he knew what will come to his young master when I find him. King John, as thou knowest, hath a special hatred toward his father, Lord De Aldithely."
"De Aldithely, sayest thou?" interrupted the man-at-arms.
"Ay, and he is resolved the son shall not live, no more than his own nephew Arthur."
"And he will put him to death?" asked the man-at-arms.
"Why, not speedily," answered Walter Skinner, importantly, "but cat and mouse fashion, by which he will be the longer dying, and his father the more tormented. He will speedily give orders also to raze his castle as a nest of traitors."
"Whence hadst thou this?" demanded the man-at-arms.
Walter Skinner stood off and looked at him. Then, with an air of great mystery, he said: "It is whispered about. I may not say more. It becometh me not."
The man-at-arms now rose from the ground where he had thrown himself and mounted his horse. "I seek not the young lord," he said. "I betray no mouse to the cat, least of all the son of the brave De Aldithely. I will back to my own master from whom thou didst borrow me. I will say thou needest me not and hast bid me return. When thou art tired of thy life, say thou otherwise." And he looked meaningly at him.
"I go with thee," said the second man-at-arms, springing from the ground.
"And I also!" exclaimed the third.
In vain Walter Skinner tried to restrain them. They clattered off down the valley whence they had come, and were soon out of sight on their way to Doncaster.
The sound carried well here; the voices of the men were loud; and Hugo and Humphrey, whose ears were keen, heard with consternation all that pa.s.sed. "I fear it meaneth death to thee also if thou be caught," said Humphrey. "For it is a serious thing to dupe a man of the king"s rage.
This calleth for dreams, and that right speedily, if we are not to fall into his hands."
The disappointed Walter Skinner made no attempt to depart. "Here will I stay a while," he said, "and berate the folly that did tell them the purpose of the king and the name of the young lord. I did think to raise myself in authority over them by showing that I did know the king"s counsel, and, in so doing, I did forget that for murdering of Arthur all men hate him, and few will help him to his will upon others." Moodily he threw himself upon the gra.s.s, having staked his horse, and soon left off berating himself by falling into a sound sleep. The sun reached the meridian, and he still slept. It came to be mid-afternoon and still he moved not, for he had ridden hard and had been deprived of his rest the night before. His tethered horse at last whinnied softly and then loudly. And, to the dismay of Hugo and Humphrey, he was answered by their own horses in the thicket. But still the king"s man moved not.
"Would that I knew certainly that he sleepeth," said Humphrey, anxiously. "For then we might come down and escape."
"Nay, nay," objected Hugo, earnestly. "Seest thou not how a little sound goeth far here? The rustling of the leaves and rattling of the boughs as we descend might awake him."
Humphrey looked at him. "Ay, poor mouse!" he said. "Mayhap thou art right."
And now Walter Skinner stirred in his slumber. Once more his horse whinnied loudly. Once more the horses in the thicket answered; and the spy, broad awake, sprang to his feet. "Aha, Fortune!" he cried, "thou art with me."
"Nevertheless," observed Humphrey, softly, "if thou hast not dreamed of going up a ladder and climbing a tree, all may not go so well with thee as thou thinkest."
Leaving his horse, the spy climbed the wooded hill, at the top of which he paused just under the oak in which Hugo and Humphrey were concealed.
The horses whinnied no more, though he waited a few moments hoping to hear them. "I will on," he cried impatiently. ""Twas from this direction the answer came." And away he hurried on foot, for he imagined that those he sought were hidden near at hand, and waiting for the night to come ere they resumed their journey. He knew that he alone could not capture them, but if he could get on their trail and dog them unseen till he could get help he would be sure of them.
As soon as the spy was out of sight Humphrey began to descend the tree.
"Whither goest thou?" asked Hugo.
"Thou shalt see," returned Humphrey.
With speed he ran down the hill, breaking a switch of birch as he ran.
He hastened to Walter Skinner"s horse, cut him loose from his tether, and struck him sharply with the birch rod. Away galloped the horse down the valley, while Humphrey hastened back to his place in the tree.
"Fortune may be with him," he said to Hugo, "but his horse is not.
Mayhap I need not another dream, for, by the one I had, I think we have got the better of him. Moreover, there will be no more whinnying for our horses to answer."
CHAPTER VII
Till the set of sun and the dusk of the evening the spy pursued the search, now stumbling over a tree root, now catching his foot in a straggling vine, and every now and then sorely struck in the face by the underbrush through which he pushed his way. But, although he was once very near the concealed horses and hound, he found nothing to reward him. The return to the little vale was even more tiresome than the journey from it had been. No moon would shine for an hour, and it was quite dark when he once more reached the oak in which Hugo and Humphrey had stayed all day, but from which they had a few moments before descended.
In climbing the tree, after setting Walter Skinner"s horse loose, Humphrey had noticed a hollow in one of the lower branches.
"Perchance," he said, "a hedgehog may lodge therein. Knowest thou the ways of hedgehogs?"
"Nay," returned Hugo, indifferently.
"The lad hath lost heart," said Humphrey to himself, "and all because of the words of this little snipe of a king"s man and the slowness of the journey. I will not seem to see it." Then he continued as if Hugo had displayed the greatest interest: "I will tell thee, then, that hedgehogs have many ways. I warrant thee this king"s man knoweth naught of them, any more than he knoweth the wood. Had he been some men, we had been caught ere now. I fear him not overmuch. For do but see how he is puffed up with undue pride and importance. And let me tell thee that undue pride and importance and good sense dwell not in the same skull.
We shall therefore have the better of him."
Hugo made no reply, and Humphrey continued cheerfully: "A hedgehog will find a hollow in a tree, and there he will bide, sleeping all day. At night he will come forth. But first he must reach the ground. And this he will do by rolling into a ball and dropping on the ends of his spines. If the ground is beneath him, no harm is done. If this king"s man should be beneath him, I think not that he would cry out that Fortune was with him when the spines of the hedgehog stuck into him."
"And how would the king"s man be beneath him?" asked Hugo, dully.
"If the hedgehog be in the hollow of that low branch," answered Humphrey, "and if the king"s man should stand under at such time as the hedgehog was ready to drop, then he would be beneath him."
"Yea," observed Hugo. "Many things might come to pa.s.s, if thou couldst make all the plans."
Humphrey did not hear the sarcasm in Hugo"s tones. He heard only what he was pleased to take as a compliment to his own abilities. "Why, I believe thou art right," he answered. "Were I to make the plans, some that are now at the top would be at the bottom. Thou hast well said.
But come. It grows dark. Let us go down ere the king"s man come back on his way to the vale."
Slowly they made their way down. "This perching on trees all day is fit to make an old man of a boy," said Humphrey, as he stepped clumsily about on his half-numbed feet.
"Sh!" said Hugo.
Humphrey instantly stood still in the darkness and listened. Weary and slow steps were approaching. They came nearer, and directly under the oak they ceased, for the spy, his pompous manner quite gone, had stopped to rest a little. And now a rustling in the branches above was heard. Eagerly the spy looked up and strained his eyes to see.
"Josceline! son of Lord De Aldithely!" he called, "I arrest thee in the king"s name. Thou darest not oppose me. Yield thyself, and come down!"
And just then the hedgehog which Humphrey had surmised might be in the hollow, moved a little farther along on the branch, rustling the leaves as he did so. In the darkness the face of the spy was still turned upward. He had forgotten that he was alone and unaided. And he thought only of getting hold of the boy he sought.
"Come down!" he repeated. "Come down, I say! Make no dallying!"