NEWBURY.
Early the next morning, after Richard had left the cottage for Raglan
castle, mistress Rees was awaked by the sound of a heavy blow against
her door. When with difficulty she had opened it, Richard or his dead
body, she knew not which, fell across her threshold. Like poor Marquis,
he had come to her for help and healing.
When he got out of the quarry, he made for the highroad, but missing the
way the dog had brought him, had some hard work in reaching it; and long
before he arrived--at the cottage, what with his wound, his loss of
blood, his double wetting, his sleeplessness after mistress Watson's
potion, want of food, disappointment and fatigue, he was in a high
fever. The last mile or two he had walked in delirium, but happily with
the one dominant idea of getting help from mother Rees. The poor woman
was greatly shocked to find that the teeth of the trap had closed upon
her favourite and mangled him so terribly. A drop or two of one of her
restoratives, however, soon brought him round so far that he was able to
crawl to the chair on which he had sat the night before, now ages agone
as it seemed, where he now sat shivering and glowing alternately, until
with trembling hands the good woman had prepared her own bed for him.
'Thou hast left thy doublet behind thee,' she said, 'and I warrant me
the cake I gave thee in the pouch thereof! Hadst thou eaten of that,
thou hadst not come to this pass.'
But Richard scarcely heard her voice. His one mental consciousness was
the longing desire to lay his aching head on the pillow, and end all
effort.
Finding his wound appeared very tolerably dressed, Mrs. Rees would not
disturb the bandages. She gave him a cooling draught, and watched by him
till he fell asleep. Then she tidied her house, dressed herself, and got
everything in order for nursing him. She would have sent at once to
Redware to let his father know where and in what condition he was, but
not a single person came near the cottage the whole day, and she dared
not leave him before the fever had subsided. He raved a good deal,
generally in the delusion that he was talking to Dorothy--who sought to
kill him, and to whom he kept giving directions, at one time how to
guide the knife to reach his heart, at another how to mingle her poison
so that it should act with speed and certainty.
At length one fine evening in early autumn, when the red sun shone level
through the window of the little room where he lay, and made a red glory
on the wall, he came to himself a little.
'Is it blood?' he murmured. 'Did Dorothy do it?--How foolish I am! It is
but a blot the sun has left behind him!--Ah! I see! I am dead and lying
on the top of my tomb. I am only marble. This is Redware church. Oh,
mother Rees, is it you! I am very glad! Cover me over a little. The pall
there.'
His eyes closed, and for a few hours he lay in a deep sleep, from which
he awoke very weak, but clear-headed. He remembered nothing, however,
since leaving the quarry, except what appeared a confused dream of
wandering through an interminable night of darkness, weariness, and
pain. His first words were,--
'I must get up, mother Rees: my father will be anxious about me.
Besides, I promised to set out for Gloucester to-day.'
She sought to quiet him, but in vain, and was at last compelled to
inform him that his father, finding he did not return, had armed
himself, mounted Oliver, and himself led his little company to join the
earl of Essex--who was now on his way, at the head of an army consisting
chiefly of the trained bands of London, to raise the siege of
Gloucester.
Richard started up, and would have leaped from the bed, but fell back
helpless and unconscious. When at length his nurse had succeeded in
restoring him, she had much ado to convince him that the best thing in
all respects was to lie still and submit to be nursed--so to get well as
soon as possible, and join his father.
'Alas, mother, I have no horse,' said Richard, and hid his face on the
pillow.
'The Lord will provide what thee wants, my son,' said the old woman with
emotion, neither asking nor caring whether the Lord was on the side of
the king or of the parliament, but as little doubting that he must be on
the side of Richard.
He soon began to eat hopefully, and after a day or two she found pretty
nearly employment enough in cooking for him.
At last, weak as he still was, he would be restrained no longer. To
Gloucester he must go, and relieve his father. Expostulation was
unavailing: go he must, he said, or his soul would tear itself out of
his body, and go without it.
'Besides, mother, I shall be getting better all the way,' he continued.
'--I must go home at once and see whether there is anything left to go
upon.'
He rose the same instant, and, regardless of the good woman's
entreaties, crawled out to go to Redware. She followed him at a little
distance, and, before he had walked a quarter of a mile, he was ready to
accept her offered arm to help him back. But his recovery was now very
rapid, and after a few days he felt able for the journey.
At home he found a note from his father, telling him where to find
money, and informing him that he was ready to yield him Oliver the
moment he should appear to claim him. Richard put on his armour, and
went to the stable. The weather had been fine, and the harvest was
wearing gradually to a close; but the few horses that were left were
overworked, for the necessities of the war had been severe, and that
part of the country had responded liberally on both sides. Besides, Mr.
Heywood had scarce left an animal judged at all fit to carry a man and
keep up with the troop.
When Richard reached the stable, there were in it but three, two of
which, having brought loads to the barn, were now having their mid-day
meal and rest. The first one was ancient in bones, with pits profound
above his eyes, and grey hairs all about a face which had once been
black.
'Thou art but fit for old Father Time to lay his scythe across when he
is aweary,' said Richard, and turned to the next.
She was a huge-bodied, short-legged punch, as fat as butter, with lop
ears and sleepy eyes. Having finished her corn, she was churning away at
a mangerful of grass.
'Thou wouldst burst thy belly at the first charge,' said Richard, and
was approaching the third, one he did not recognise, when a vicious,
straight-out kick informed him that here was temper at least, probably
then spirit. But when he came near enough to see into the stall, there
stood the ugliest brute he thought that ever ate barley. He was very
long-bodied and rather short-legged, with great tufts at his fetlocks,
and the general look of a huge rat, in part doubtless from having no
hair on his long undocked tail. He was biting vigorously at his manger,
and Richard could see the white of one eye glaring at him askance in the
gloom.
'Dunnot go nigh him, sir,' cried Jacob Fortune, who had come up behind.
'Thou knows not his tricks. His name be his nature, and we call him
Beelzebub when master Stopchase be not by. I be right glad to see your
honour up again.'
Jacob was too old to go to the wars, and too indifferent to regret it;
but he was faithful, and had authority over the few men left.
'I thank you, Jacob,' said Richard. 'What brute is this? I know him
not.'
'We all knows him too well, master Richard, though verily Stopchase
bought him but the day before he rode, thinking belike he might carry an
ear or two of wheat. If he be not very good he was not parlous dear; he
paid for him but an old song. He was warranted to have work in him if a
man but knew how to get it out.'
'He is ugly.'
'He is the ugliest horse, cart-horse, nag, or courser, on this
creation-side,' said the old man, '--ugly enough to fright to death
where he doth fail in his endeavour to kill. The men are all mortal
feared on him, for he do kick and he do bite like the living Satan. He
wonnot go in no cart, but there he do stand eating on his head off as
fast as he can. An' the brute were mine, I would slay him; I would, in
good sooth.'
'An' I had but time to cure him of his evil kicking! I fear I must ever
ride the last in the troop,' said Richard.
'Why for sure, master, thee never will ride such a devil-pig as he to
the wars! Will Farrier say he do believe he take his strain from the
swine the devils go into in the miracle. All the children would make a
mock of thee as thou did ride through the villages. Look at his legs:
they do be like stile-posts; and do but look at his tail!'
'Lead him out, Jacob, and let me see his head.'
'I dare not go nigh him, sir. I be not nimble enough to get out of the
way of his hoof. 'I be too old, master.'
Richard pulled on his thick buff glove and went straight into his stall.
The brute made a grab at him with his teeth, met by a smart blow from
Richard's fist, which he did not like, and, rearing, would have struck
at him with his near fore-foot; but Richard caught it by the pastern,
and with his left hand again struck him on the side of the mouth. The
brute then submitted to be led out by the halter. And verily he was ugly
to behold. His neck stuck straight out, and so did his tail, but the
latter went off in a point, and the former in a hideous knob.
'Here is Jack!' cried the old man. 'He lets Jack ride him to the water.
Here, Jack! Get thee upon the hog-back of Beelzebub, and mind the
bristles do not flay thee, and let master Richard see what paces he
hath.'
The animal tried to take the lad down with his hind foot as he mounted,
but scarcely was he seated when he set off at a swinging trot, in which
he plied his posts in manner astonishing. Spirit indeed he must have
had, and plenty, to wield such clubs in such a fashion. His joints were
so loose that the bones seemed to fly about, yet they always came down
right.
'He is guilty of "hypocrisy against the devil,"' said Richard: 'he is
better than he looks. Anyhow, if he but carry me thither, he will as
well "fill a pit" as a handsomer horse. I'll take him. Have you got a
saddle for him?'
'An' he had not brought a saddle with him, thou would not find one in
Gwent to fit him,' said the old man.
Yet another day Richard found himself compelled to tarry--which he spent
in caparisoning Beelzebub to the best of his ability, with the result of
making him, if possible, appear still uglier than before.
The eve of the day of his departure, Marquis paid mistress Rees a second
visit. He wanted no healing or help this time, seeming to have come only
to offer his respects. But the knowledge that here was a messenger, dumb
and discreet, ready to go between and make no sign, set Richard longing
to use him: what message he did send by him I have already recorded.
Although, however, the dog left them that night, he did not reach Raglan
till the second morning after, and must have been roaming the country or
paying other visits all that night and the next day as well, with the
letter about him, which he had allowed no one to touch.
At last Richard was on his way to Gloucester, mounted on Beelzebub, and
much stared at by the inhabitants of every village he passed through.
Apparently, however, there was something about the centaur-compound
which prevented their rudeness from going farther. Beelzebub bore him
well, and, though not a comfortable horse to ride, threw the road behind
him at a wonderful rate, as often and as long as Richard was able to
bear it. But he found himself stronger after every rest, and by the time
he began to draw nigh to Gloucester, he was nearly as well as ever, and
in excellent spirits; one painful thought only haunting him--the fear
that he might, mounted on Beelzebub, have to encounter some one on his
beloved mare. He was consoled, however, to think that the brute was less
dangerous to one before than one behind him, heels being worse than
teeth.
He soon became aware that something decisive had taken place: either
Gloucester had fallen, or Essex had raised the siege, for army there was
none, though the signs of a lately upbroken encampment were visible on
all sides. Presently, inquiring at the gate, he learned that, on the
near approach of Essex, the besieging army had retired, and that, after
a few days' rest, the general had turned again in the direction of
London. Richard, therefore, having fed Beelzebub and eaten his own
dinner, which in his present condition was more necessary than usual to
his being of service, mounted his hideous charger once more, and pushed
on to get up with the army.
Essex had not taken the direct road to London, but kept to the
southward. That same day he followed him as far as Swindon, and found he
was coming up with him rapidly. Having rested a short night, he reached
Hungerford the next morning, which he found in great commotion because
of the intelligence that at Newbury, some seven miles distant only,
Essex had found his way stopped by the king, and that a battle had been
raging ever since the early morning.
Having given his horse a good feed of oats and a draught of ale, Richard
mounted again and rode hard for Newbury. Nor had he rode long before he
heard the straggling reports of carbines, looked to the priming of his
pistols, and loosened his sword in its sheath. When he got under the
wall of Craven park, the sounds of conflict grew suddenly plainer. He
could distinguish the noise of horses' hoofs, and now and then the
confused cries and shouts of hand-to-hand conflict. At Spain he was all
but in it, for there he met wounded men, retiring slowly or carried by
their comrades. These were of his own part, but he did not stop to ask
any questions. Beelzebub snuffed at the fumes of the gunpowder, and
seemed therefrom to derive fresh vigour.
The lanes and hedges between Spein and Newbury had been the scenes of
many a sanguinary tussle that morning, for nowhere had either army found
room to deploy. Some of them had been fought over more than once or
twice. But just before Richard came up, the tide had ebbed from that
part of the way, for Essex's men had had some advantage, and had driven
the king's men through the town and over the bridge, so that he found
the road clear, save of wounded men and a few horses. As he reached
Spinhamland, and turned sharp to the right into the main street of
Newbury, a bullet from the pistol of a royalist officer who lay wounded
struck Beelzebub on the crest--what of a crest he had--and without
injuring made him so furious that his rider had much ado to keep him
from mischief. For, at the very moment, they were met by a rush of
parliament pikemen, retreating, as he could see, over their heads, from
a few of the kings cavalry, who came at a sharp trot down the main
street. The pikemen had got into disorder pursuing some of the enemy who
had divided and gone to the right and left up the two diverging streets,
and when the cavalry appeared at the top of the main street, both parts,
seeing themselves in danger of being surrounded, had retreated. They
were now putting the Kennet with its narrow bridge between them and the
long-feathered cavaliers, in the hope of gaining time and fit ground for
forming and presenting a bristled front. In the midst of this confused
mass of friends Richard found himself, the maddened Beelzebub every
moment lashing out behind him when not rearing or biting.
Before him the bridge rose steep to its crown, contracting as it rose.
At its foot, where it widened to the street, stood a single horseman,
shouting impatiently to the last of the pikemen, and spurring his horse
while holding him. As the last man cleared the bridge, he gave him rein,
and with a bound and a scramble reached the apex, and stood--within half
a neck of the foremost of the cavalier troop. A fierce combat instantly
began between them. The bridge was wide enough for two to have fought
side by side, but the roundhead contrived so to work his antagonist, who
was a younger but less capable and less powerful man, that no comrade
could get up beside him for the to-and-fro shifting of his horse.
Meantime Richard had been making his slow way through the swarm of
hurrying pikemen, doing what he could to keep them off Beelzebub. The
moment he was clear, he made a great bolt for the bridge, and the same
moment perceived who the brave man was.
'Hold on, sir,' he shouted. 'Hold your own, father! Here I am! Here is
Richard!'
And as he shouted he sent Beelzebub, like low-flying bolt from
cross-bow, up the steep crown of the bridge, and wedged him in between
Oliver and the parapet, just as a second cavalier made a dart for the
place. At his horse Beelzebub sprang like a fury, rearing, biting, and
striking out with his fore-feet in such manner as quite to make up to
his rider for the disadvantage of his low stature. The cavalier's horse
recoiled in terror, rearing also, but snorting and backing and wavering,
so that, in his endeavours to avoid the fury of Beelzebub, which was
frightful to see, for with ears laid back and gleaming teeth he looked
more like a beast of prey, he would but for the crowd behind him have
fallen backward down the slope. A bullet from one of Richard's pistols
sent his rider over his tail, the horse fell sideways against that of
Mr. Heywood's antagonist, and the path was for a moment barricaded.
'Well done, good Beelzebub!' cried Richard, as he reined him back on to
the crest of the bridge.
'Boy!' said his father sternly, at the same instant dealing his
encumbered opponent a blow on the head-piece which tumbled him also from
his horse, 'is the sacred hour of victory a time to sully with profane
and foolish jests? I little thought to hear such words at my side--not
to say from the mouth of my own son!'
'Pardon me, father; I praised my horse,' said Richard. 'I think not he
ever had praise before, but it cannot corrupt him, for he is such an
ill-conditioned brute that they that named him did name him Beelzebub:
Now that he hath once done well, who knoweth but it may cease to fit
him!'
'I am glad thy foolish words were so harmless,' returned Mr. Heywood,
smiling. 'In my ears they sounded so evil that I could ill accept their
testimony.--Verily the animal is marvellous ill-favoured, but, as thou
sayest, he hath done well, and the first return we make him shall be to
give him another name. The less man or horse hath to do with Satan the
better, for what is he but the arch-foe of the truth?'
While they spoke, they kept a keen watch on the enemy--who could not get
near to attack them, save with a few pistol-bullets, mostly
wide-shot--for both horses were down, and their riders helpless if not
slain.
'What shall we call him then, father?' asked Richard.
'He is amazing like a huge rat!' said his father. 'Let us henceforth
call him Bishop.'
'Wherefore Bishop and not Beelzebub, sir?' inquired Richard.
Mr. Heywood laughed, but ere he could reply, a large troop of horsemen
appeared at the top of the street. Glancing then behind in some anxiety,
they saw to their relief that the pikemen had now formed themselves into
a hollow square at the foot of the bridge, prepared to receive cavalry.
They turned therefore, and, passing through them, rode to find their
regiment.
From that day Bishop, notwithstanding his faults many and grievous, was
regarded with respect by both father and son, Richard vowing never to
mount another, let laugh who would, so long as the brute lived and he
had not recovered Lady.
But they had to give him room for two on the march, and the place behind
him was always left vacant, which they said gave no more space than he
wanted, seeing he kicked out his leg to twice its walking length. Before
long, however, they had got so used to his ways that they almost ceased
to regard them as faults, and he began to grow a favourite in the
regiment.