"Sir, we have little enough room. He is in my own chamber lying on my bed."
The knight gave a dry laugh.
"You mean that I may not venture into a lady"s chamber, shameface?
Well, a boy may go where a boy is, I suppose. Vincent, go and explore the acolyte."
"The page may come," said Alice, and watched him go, not without interest, perhaps not without amus.e.m.e.nt.
The unconscious Vincent was Isoult"s next visitant, stepping briskly into the room. He came right up to the bed as in his right and element, a boy dealing with a boy"s monkey tricks. One watchful grey eye, the curve of one rosy cheek peering from the blankets, told him a new story.
"Oh, Isoult," says he in a twitter, "is it you indeed?"
"Yes, hush! You will never betray me, Vincent?"
"Betray!" he cried. "Ah, Saints! My tongue would blister if I let the truth on you. But you are quite safe. The damsel won"t let her in; she thinks she has a man to deal with. Me she let in!" Vincent chuckled at the irony of the thing. Then he grew anxious over his beloved.
"You had no mishaps? You are not hurt? Tired?"
"All safe. Not tired now. What will she do next?"
"Ah, there! She is for High March. That I know. She means to find you there. She means mischief. You must take great care. You have never seen her in mischief. I have. Oh, Christ!" He winced at the recollection.
"I will go advisedly," said Isoult. "Have no fear for me. I shall be there before she is."
Vincent sighed. "I must go. Good-bye, Isoult. I shall see you again, I am very sure."
"I hope you will. Good-bye."
He did not dare so much as touch the bed, but went out at once to make his report. He had questioned the boy--a dull boy, but he thought honest. a.s.suredly he had seen no lady on his way. His lies deceived Maulfry, who would have known better but for her p.r.o.neness to think everybody a fool. Soon Isoult heard the thud of hoofs on the herbage; then Alice came running in to hear the story at large.
The two girls became very friendly. Their heads got close together over Prosper and Galors and Maulfry--the Golden Knight who was a woman! The escape savoured a miracle, was certainly the act of some heavenly power. An Archangel, Alice thought, to which Isoult, convinced that it was Love, a.s.sented for courtesy.
"Though for my part," she added, "I lean hardly upon Saint Isidore."
"You do well," said Alice, "he is a great saint. Is he your patron?"
"I think he is," said Isoult.
"Then it is he who has helped you, be sure. No other could know the ins and outs of your story so well, or make such close provision. The Archangels, you see, are few, and their business very great." Isoult agreed.
Of Prosper Alice could not get a clear image. When Isoult was upon that theme her visions blinded her, and sent her for refuge to abstractions. She candidly confessed that he did not love her; but then she did not ask that he should.
"But you pray, "Give him me all,"" Alice objected.
"Yes, I want to be his servant, and that he should have no other. I cannot bear that any one should do for him what I can do best. That is what I tell the Holy Virgin."
"And Saint Isidore, I hope," said Alice gently; but Isoult thought not.
"It would be useless to tell Saint Isidore," she explained.
"He is a man, and men think differently of these matters. They want more, and do not understand to be contented with much less."
"Forgive me, Isoult. I know nothing of love and lovers. But if you marry this lord--as I suppose you might?"
"He might marry _me_," said Isoult slowly.
"Well, then, is there no more to look for in marriage but the liberty to serve?"
"I look for nothing else."
"But he might?"
"Ah, ah! If he did!"
"Well?"
"Oh, Alice, I love him so!"
"Darling Isoult--I see now. Forgive me."
The two friends cried together and kissed, as girls will. Then they talked of what there was to do. Isoult was resolute to go.
"She will ride straight to High March," she said. "I know her. My lord is there. If she finds not me, she will find him, and endanger his ease. I must be there first. She must follow the paths, however they wind, because she is mounted on a heavy horse. I shall go through the brakes by ways that I know. I shall easily outwit her in the forest."
"But you cannot walk, dearest. It is many days to High March."
"I shall ride."
"What will you ride, goose?"
"A forest pony, of course."
"Will you go as you are--like a boy, Isoult?"
Alice was aghast at the possibility; but Isoult, who had many reasons for it apart from her own safety (forgotten in the sight of Prosper"s), was clear that she would. Prosper she knew was the guest of the Countess Isabel, a vaguely great and crowned lady; probably he was one of many guests. "And how shall I, a poor girl, come at him in the midst of such a company?" she asked herself. But if she went with a tale of being his page Roy he might admit her to some service, to hand his cup, or just to lie at his door of a night. The real Roy had done more than this; he would never refuse her so much. So she thought at least; and at the worst she would have s.p.a.ce to tell her message.
At noon, the forest pony captured and haltered with a rope, she started. Alice was tearful, but Isoult, high in affairs, had no time to consider Alice. She gave her a kiss, stooping from the saddle, thanked her for what she had done on Prosper"s account, and flew. She never looked back to wave a hand or watch a hand-waving; she was in a fever for action. Going, she calculated profoundly. There was a choice of ways. The great road from Wanmouth to High March skirted Marbery Down (where she had watched the stars and heard the sheep-bells many a still night), and then ran east by the forest edge to Worple. It only took in Worple by a wide divagation; after that it curved back to the forest, ran fairly clean to Market Basing, thence over ridges and coombs, but climbing mostly, it fetched up at High March. It was a military road. Well, she might follow Maulfry on this road till within a couple of days of the castle; it would ensure safety for her, and a good footing for her beast. On the other hand, if she rode due north over everything (as she knew she could), she would steal at least one more day. And could she afford to lose a clear day with Prosper? Ah, and it would give a margin against miscarriage of the news by any adverse fate on either of them. Before she framed the question she knew it answered. Her road then was to be dead north across the edge of Spurnt Heath (where her father"s cottage was), past Martle Brush, stained with the black blood of Galors, then on to the parting of the ways, and by the right-hand road to High March. Thinking it over, she put her journey at three, and Maulfry"s at four days. Maulfry"s was actually rather less, as will appear.
If all this prove dull to the reader, I can only tell him that he had better know his way about Morgraunt than lose it, as I have very often done in the course of my hot-head excursions. There are so many trackless regions in it, so many great lakes of green with never an island of a name, that to me, at least, it is salvation to have solid verifiable spots upon which to put a finger and say--"Here is Waisford, here Tortsentier, here is the great river Wan, here by the grace of G.o.d and the Countess of Hauterive is Saint Giles of Holy Thorn." Of course to Isoult it was different. She had been a forester all her life. To her there were names (and names of dread) not to be known of any map. Deerleap, One Ash, the Wolves" Valley, the Place of the Withered Elm, the Charcoal-Burners", the Mossy Christ, the Birch- grove, the Brook under the Brow--and a hundred more. She steered by these, with all foresters. What she did not remember, or did not know, was that Maulfry had also lived in Morgraunt and knew the ways by heart. Still, she had a better mount than the Lady of Tortsentier, and Love for a link-boy.
However fast she rode for her mark, her way seemed long enough as she battled through that shadowed land, forded brooks, stole by the edge of wastes or swamps, crossed open rides in fear what either vista might set bare, climbed imperceptibly higher and higher towards the spikes of Hauterive, upon whose woody bluffs stands High March. Not upon one beast could she have done what she did; one took her a day and a night going at the pace she exacted. She knew by her instincts where the herds of ponies ran. It was easy to catch and halter any one she chose; no forest beast went in fear of her who had the wild-wood savour in her hair--but it meant more contriving and another stretch for her tense brain. For herself, she hardly dared stay at all.
Prosper"s breast under a dagger! If she had stayed she would not have slept. The fever and the fever only kept her up; for a slim and tender girl she went through incredible fatigues. But while the fever lasted so did she, alert, wise, discreet, incessantly active. Part of her journey--for the half of one day--she actually had Maulfry in full view; saw her riding easily on her great white Fleming, saw the glint of the golden armour, and Vincent ambling behind her on his cob, catching at the leaves as he went, for lack of something better. She was never made out by them,--at a time like this her wits were finer than her enemy"s,--so she was able to learn how much time she had to spare. That night she slept for three hours. As for her food, we know that she could supply herself with that; and when the deer failed her, she scrupled nothing (she so abject with whom she loved!) to demand it of whomsoever she happened to meet. She grew as bold as a winter robin. One evening she sat by a gipsy fire with as shrewd a set of cut-throats as you would wish to hang. She never turned a hair.
Another night she fell in with some s.h.a.ggy drovers leading cattle from March into Waisford, and shared the cloak and pillow of one of them without a quiver. Having dozed and started half-a-dozen times in a couple of hours, she got up without disturbing her bed-fellow and took to the woods again. So she came to her last day, when she looked to see the High March towers and what they held.
On that day at noon, as she sat resting near a four-went-way, she heard the tramp of horses, the clatter of arms. She hid herself, just in time, in a thicket of wild rose, and waited to see what was threatening. It proved to be a company of soldiers--she counted fifty, but there were more--well armed with spears, whose banneroles were black and white. They rode at a trot to the crossways; there one cried halt. They were within ten yards of her, but happily there were no dogs. Then she heard another horse--that of the captain, as she guessed. She saw him come round the bend of the ride, a burly man, black upon a black horse. There were white feathers in his helmet; on his shield three white wicket-gates. Galors! At this moment her heart did not fail her. It scarcely beat faster. She was able to listen at her ease.
They debated of ways; Galors seemed in doubt, and vexed at doubting.
One of them pointed the road to High March.