Dazed by the flickering light of the furnace and the sunset glow beyond, the soldiers made very ineffectual plunges into the dark shadow, whence, fencing and parrying, and with many a quip and sally, Jack had at first an easy task in keeping them at bay.
This was mere child"s play to him; already one of the men had an ugly gash in his cheek, and the next moment saw the Sergeant reeling backwards, with a well-directed thrust through his right arm.
But easy and exciting as was this brilliant sword-play, it could not in the long run be of much avail. Hardly had the Sergeant fallen back than three more soldiers, also hot and furious, came rushing in to reinforce their comrades. Bathurst had in his day been counted the finest fencer in England, his wrist was as fresh and strong as the steel which he held, but the odds were beginning to acc.u.mulate against him.
Five men in the shed, and the others could not be very far away!
John Stich felt his muscles nearly cracking with the vigorous effort to maintain his quiescent position and not to come to the rescue of his hard-pressed friend.
Suddenly one of the soldiers levelled his musket.
Patience saw it and gave a cry of horror. Stich, throwing prudence to the winds, would have rushed forward, to prevent this awful thing at any cost, but the Sergeant, though wounded, had lost none of his zest, and his eye had been fixed on the smith.
"Keep back the smith!" he shouted, "use your bayonets! quick!"
And as two of his men obeyed him, he himself threw his full weight against John, and together the three men succeeded in rendering the worthy fellow momentarily powerless.
"Captain! Captain!" he shouted desperately, "have a care!"
Of course Jack had realised his danger. The group of his a.s.sailants stood out in every detail before him, like a clear-cut sunlit picture.
But against the musket levelled at him he could do nothing, it was Luck"s chance to do him a good turn; he himself was hard pressed by two men close to his knees.
Patience felt as if her heart would cease to beat, her impulse was to rush blindly, stupidly forward, when suddenly a piping voice, vague and uncertain, was heard above the click of Jack"s sword.
"Don"t "ee let "em get "ee, sir!" and Jock Miggs, with trembling, yet determined hands, gave a vigorous tug to the coat tails of the soldier, who was even now pulling the trigger of his musket. The latter, who had been aiming very deliberately for the one bright patch on Jack"s person caused by the red glow of the furnace, lost his aim: there was a loud report, and a bullet went whizzing high above Bathurst"s head, and buried itself in the woodwork above him.
This was the signal for a new phase of this curious and unequal struggle. The shepherds, at first, knowing nothing of the cause of this quarrel, had stood open-mouthed, somewhat frightened and awaiting events, at a short distance from the scene of the scuffle.
But when the chestnut horse had been led out into the open, they suddenly had an inkling as to who its owner was. Jack o" Lantern, bearing the masked highwayman on his back, was well known to the poor folk on Bra.s.sing Moor.
Beau Brocade, who but yesterday had left fifty guineas in the Bra.s.sington poor box! Beau Brocade, the hero of the Heath! He! to be caught by a parcel of red coats?
Never! Jock Miggs but voiced the feeling of the majority.
"Noa! Noa!" they shouted l.u.s.tily. "Don"t "ee let "em get "ee, sir!"
"Not if I can help it, friends!" rejoined Bathurst in gay response.
They did not resist the soldiers; not they! Your Derbyshire yokel is too cautious an individual to run absolutely counter to established authority, but they saw their friend, their helper and benefactor, in trouble and they did what they could to help him. They got in the way, jostled the soldiers when they dared, kept the attention of one or two occupied, preventing a general onslaught on the oak table, on which Bathurst, still alert, still keen, was holding his own against such terrible odds.
"There"s for you, my gallant lobster," quoth Jack, gaily.
He was standing far back on the table, entrenched between the wall on one side and the furnace on the other, and every time one of the soldiers ventured too near, his sword would dart out of the gloom: it seemed like a living creature of fire and steel, so quick and bold were his feints and parries, his sudden attacks in quarte and sixte, and all the while he kept one eye on the open Moor, where Jack o" Lantern, quivering with impatience, stood pawing the ground, and sniffing the keen evening air, ready to carry his master away, out upon the Heath, out of sight and out of danger.
Obviously the unequal contest could not last much longer. Jack knew that as well as any one. Already the red dots in the far distance had drawn considerably nearer, the next few minutes would bring this fresh reinforcement to the wearied, exhausted a.s.sailants.
The Sergeant too was ready to seize his best opportunity. He still kept two men on guard over the smith, but he soon saw that the two, who were storming Bathurst"s improvised citadel, were no match with their clumsy bayonets against a brilliant fencer who, moreover, had the advantage of light and shadow, and of his elevated position.
Though he was wounded, and bleeding profusely, he had set his heart on the capture of this mysterious stranger, and having cast a glance on the open Moor beyond, he saw with renewed zest two more of his men hurrying along. With all the strength he had left he shouted to them to come on, and then turned to encourage the others.
"Take it easy, my men! Hold out a moment longer. We"ve got the rebel at last."
But Jack too had seen and understood. He was neither tired nor hurt, but two more men against him would inevitably prove his undoing.
Already he could hear the shouts of the soldiers hurrying in response to their Sergeant"s call. The next minute they would be in the forge.
A sudden change of tactics led his two a.s.sailants to venture nearer than they had done hitherto; he drew back into the shadows, and they, fired by the l.u.s.t of capture, under the impression that he was at last exhausted, ventured nearer and nearer still; already they were leaning over the edge of the table, one man was thrusting at Bathurst"s legs, when the latter, with a rapidity that seemed quicker than a flash of lightning, disengaged his left arm from his heavy coat, and with both hands threw it right over the heads of the two men. Before they had time to release themselves from its folds, Jack, with one bound was off the table, and the next instant he had torn open the door of the furnace and dragged out the huge iron poker with which the smith raked his fire, and with a cry of triumph slung this new and formidable weapon high over his head.
The effect of this sudden move was one of uncontrollable panic: the red-hot metal, as he swung it over his head, dropped a far-reaching shower of burning sparks; soldiers and Sergeant all drew back instinctively, and Jack, still brandishing his weapon, reached the entrance and was out in the open before any one dared to stop him.
There he flung the great glowing thing in the direction of his a.s.sailants, who even now were rallying to the attack.
But the moment had been precious to Bathurst, and Jack o" Lantern was a king among horses. Without use of stirrup or rein, Jack, like the true child of the wild Moor that he was, flung himself upon the beautiful creature"s back.
Thus Patience saw him for one brief second, framed in the doorway of the forge, the last rays of the setting sun forming a background of crimson and gold for his slim, upright figure, and the brown curls on his head.
It was but a moment"s vision, but one she would carry enshrined in her memory through all the years to come. His eyes, large, glowing, magnetic, met hers in a flash, and hers, bright with unshed tears, met his in quick response.
"Soldiers!" he shouted, as he rode away, "an you think I am a rebel lord, then after me, quick! whilst I ride towards the sunset."
PART II
THE HEATH
CHAPTER XV
THE OUTLAW
Beau Brocade drew rein on the spur of the hill. He had galloped all the way from the forge, out towards the sunset, then on, ever on, over gorse and bracken, on red sandy soil and soft carpet of ling, on, still on!
Overhead, on the blue-green dome of the evening sky, a giant comet, made up of myriads of tiny, rose-tipped clouds, formed a fairy way, ever diminishing, ever more radiant, pointing westwards to the setting sun, where orange and crimson and blue melted in one glorious mist of gold.
Out far away, the distant Tors glowed in the evening light, like great barriers to some mystic elusive land beyond.
Jack o" Lantern had responded to his master"s mood. The reins falling loosely on his neck, needing neither guide nor spur, save the excitement of his own mad career, he had continued his wild gallop on the Heath, until a sudden jerk of the reins brought him to a standstill on the very edge of a steep declivity, with quivering flanks and sensitive nerves all a-tremble, even as the last ruddy glow died out in the western sky.
One by one the myriads of rose-tipped clouds now put on their grey cloaks of evening. From the rain-soaked ground and dripping branches of bramble or fern, a blue mist was rising upwards, blending deep shadows and tender lights in one hazy monotone.
Gradually every sound died out upon the Heath, only from afar came intermittently the mournful booming of a solitary bittern, astray from its nest, or now and then the sudden quaking of a tuft of gra.s.s, a tremor amidst the young fronds of the bracken, there, where a melancholy toad was seeking shelter for the night.
Awesome, silent, majestic, the great Moor was at peace. The pa.s.sions, the strife, the turmoil of mankind seemed far, very far away: further than that twinkling star which peeped down, shy and solitary, from across the rolling billows of boundless universe.
Beau Brocade stretched out both arms, and sighed in an agony of longing.
Fire was in his veins, a burning thirst in his heart, for something he dared not define.