THE STRANGER BY THE WAY
“You’ve a gray day for a start and a gallows at the end,” Allestree
spoke encouragingly, as he lounged in the doorway of the manor house.
“’Twill be profitable to you, Master Gwyeth, to turn your thoughts as
you go to composing your last good-night,” Mahone paused in lighting his
pipe to add cheerfully.
Hugh put his attention to drawing on his gauntlets and made no reply; in
the last twelve hours there had been threats and expostulations and
jeers enough to teach him that his only course was to be silent and keep
to his determination.
“I’ll lay you five shillings, George, he loses courage and sneaks back
in time for dinner,” Mahone resumed.
The blood shot up to Hugh’s face; he knew that was what Mahone wanted,
and he was the angrier that he had gratified him. He turned sharp away
and fumbled at Bayard’s headstall till he felt surer of his
self-control, then asked stiffly: “Can you tell me if the captain is in
the west parlor? I must take my leave of him.”
“I don’t begrudge you the task,” Allestree hinted. “The captain lost his
temper at Northrope, because the scurvy little tavern was so ill
supplied, and he has not found it again yet. So look to yourself, Hugh.”
It did not need Allestree’s warning to bring the heart down into Hugh’s
boots; the mere inhospitality of the closely shut door of the west
parlor and the grim tone in which Butler bade him come in were enough to
daunt him. The captain had been writing ponderously at the table in the
centre of the room, but at Hugh’s coming he flung down his pen, and,
after surveying him scowlingly, burst out: “You’re still set in your
folly, then? Well, for Dick Strangwayes’ sake I’d fain have saved you,
in spite of your cursed sullen ways.”
“I have not meant to be discourteous to you, Captain Butler,” Hugh
protested; “I thank you for sheltering me and saving me that first time,
I do thank you heartily. But now I think it better—”
“To seek other company,” Butler retorted. “If you were a bit older, I’d
be angry with you, sir; and if you were a small bit younger, by the
Lord, I’d cuff some wit into you; as ’tis—Well, I’ll shake hands, if you
wish. On my soul, ’tis pity so decent a lad should not have the sense to
keep his head on his shoulders.” Thereupon he turned his back, and, with
great show of being occupied, fell to his writing, so Hugh, feeling
miserably rebuked, had no course but to go quietly from the room.
Perhaps his downcast state touched Allestree a little, for he met him
more kindly and spared farther jests while Hugh was mounting Bayard.
“Better go to Tamworth if you are ill at ease here,” he counselled
wisely. “But in any case God speed you and protect you for the sake of
the innocence of you.”
At this Mahone went into a fit of laughter, from which he recovered only
in time to bawl a farewell that reached Hugh but faintly, as he rode out
by the sentinel at the gate of Woodstead.
Travelling slowly, to spare Bayard after his heavy work of the preceding
day, he came about noon to a cross-road, where for a moment he
hesitated: should it be north to seek Sir William’s help, or south to
put himself into the provost’s hands and trust to his own innocence of
ill intent to bring him clear? But he soon told himself that, if Sir
William had had the power to aid, he would long ago have helped Dick
Strangwayes; and, in any case, he had no will to live longer in holes
and corners, as if he were indeed the murderer Peregrine had called him.
Perhaps he would find friends if he went on boldly. So he jogged
southward at an easy pace, so easy, indeed, that he gave up all idea of
reaching Oxford that day. “And we don’t care to lie in the fields,
Bayard,” he talked softly to the horse. “And we’ve not a penny to our
names to hire lodgings. What say you if we swerve off to Ashcroft?
Perhaps they’ll shelter us this night.”
At heart he knew they would, yet, remembering how carelessly he had
departed thence, he felt a little backward about presenting himself to
the Widow Flemyng. His pace lagged more and more as he drew near the
farm, and he might have halted short to reconsider, had not the spat of
rain upon the white roadway warned him to look to the sky. There the
clouds were black with storm and thunder, so, having no wish to come at
last to Oxford all bedraggled, he spurred forward hastily and galloped
Bayard into Ashcroft stable just as the rain began pelting down.
Storm or no storm, so soon as he had delivered over the horse to Ralph’s
care, he put his head down and ran for the house, where he pitched
blindly in at the kitchen door. He heard a shriek from Nancy, “Preserve
us! mistress, ’tis Master Burley come back,” and then the widow’s
peremptory tones: “Take those boots off right where you stand, sir, else
you’ll track mud over my new-sanded floor.”
Hugh balanced uneasily on one foot as he obeyed, then asked meekly if he
mightn’t be permitted to sit down now?
“Oh, at table, is it?” questioned the widow, bustling to the nearest
cupboard. “Hungry as ever, I take it?”
“Always,” Hugh replied, and fetched a stool to the table against the
kitchen wall, where he was presently busy with a cold capon.
In the midst the widow paused at his side and laid a folded paper by his
trencher. “’Tis well you came hither now, Master Burley,” she said.
“This was fetched from Tamworth for you by a close-mouthed trooper three
days agone. I was almost resolving me to get upon the old mare and ride
to seek you at Woodstead. I am no chit of a girl to fear those saucy
knaves.”
Hugh laughed, and with frank curiosity unfolded the paper; within were
two gold sovereigns, but not a sign of writing, though he turned the
sheet over and over. “What does this mean?” he asked blankly.
“I’ve told all I know,” replied the widow. “I did my best to learn more
of the fellow who brought it.”
Hugh finished his dinner in silence, while he turned over various
solutions. Dick was out of the kingdom, and in any case he would never
have sent the coins and no word; but Sir William had supplied them with
money while they lay hid at the “Sceptre”; or perhaps Frank, with his
well-filled pockets and his boyish fondness for mystery, had had to do
with this. At any rate the money was there in his hands and made his
journey easier, so much so that he felt, had he been superstitious, he
would have hailed it as a sign that he was to go on to Oxford as he had
started.
Yet when the twilight shut in, gray with drizzling rain, there came on
him a heavy feeling of uncertainty; his own determination, though he
felt so sure of it, weakened a little before the memory of the
opposition of all his friends. In such a mood he loitered into the
cottage parlor, where, finding the Widow Flemyng sitting idle in the
dusk, he drew up a stool and blurted out to her his true name and how
matters stood with him. “I fear you’d not have cared to harbor me, had
you known what a charge I lay under,” he concluded humbly.
“Why, child, I suspected all along,” the good woman hastened to reply,
and Hugh, staring dutifully at the gray rain outside the lattice,
thought it wise not to contradict her. It gratified him, too, as she
continued speaking, to find she did not hold him a fool for his
resolution. Indeed, she said emphatically no worse harm could befall a
decent lad at Oxford than at Woodstead, and in any case she was well
assured no one would ever have the heart to hang him. “You were best
cast yourself on the king’s mercy,” she ended. “Now had you great
friends at court, or could get to have audience with his Majesty.”
“Did you ever hear the ballad of ‘Johnny Armstrong’?” Hugh asked. “Dick
used to sing it. There was a man sought the king for pardon and he got
little good by it.”
All the same her assurances made him more confident in himself, so he
slept that night untroubled and woke ready for whatever the day might
bring. Perhaps it was the widow’s continued encouragements, perhaps it
was the good breakfast he made, or perhaps the sight of the sun
struggling through the watery clouds, that served still farther to put
him in high spirits. Be as that may, he took a gay farewell of Widow
Flemyng and of Nancy, and cantered out by the pasture lane at a hopeful
pace, as if he were eager to cover the distance to Oxford and whatever
waited him there.
The rain of the preceding day had laid the dust well, and left in the
air a lingering fragrance of moist earth and beaten grasses that made it
a temptation to slacken speed along the country road. In the hedges by
the wayside the honeysuckle was still dripping with wet; Hugh pulled a
tuft of blossoms as he passed, and crushed them slowly in his bare hand.
How sweet and good was life in summer time, he reflected, and then he
flung the blossoms away and, whistling persistently, thought no more,
for his mind was all made up.
At the first tavern he came to he bought him a draught of ale, bravely,
now there was money in his pocket, then trotted on without halt till
past noon. By that the sun had burnt away the clouds, and the still heat
made the journey less pleasant; so, coming upon a sleepy village with a
small neat inn, the “Bear and Ragged Staff,” Hugh thought well to rest
the midday hours and get food for himself and his horse. The fear of
being recognized and apprehended before he should have a chance to give
himself up made him call for a private room, where he ate alone, except
that the host bustled in to serve him and retail a variety of gossip.
Oxford was near enough for the daily news to pass to the village, so
Hugh heard a deal of authentic information of how the king was said to
lean now to the counsels of the hot-heads and to the army, and how the
royal troops might any day set forth to take in Bristol. He scarcely
heeded more, for the talk of Oxford had turned his thoughts again to
what was before him. Where should he eat his next meal, he wondered,
with a remembrance of the grim Castle; and then, impatient at his own
faltering, he jumped up hastily, and, paying his reckoning, went down to
the little court of the inn, where he bade them saddle Bayard at once.
The horse had been led out into the shade of an open shed, and Hugh was
lingering by the stirrup to fee the hostler, when outside the gateway
sounded a great clattering of hoofs, and a gentleman came spurring in
upon a white horse, that stumbled on three legs. “Have me hither a fresh
mount, briskly, you knaves!” he shouted, flinging a handful of loose
coin among the stable-boys and loiterers. Then, as he put eyes on
Bayard, he swung himself from his saddle. “This beast will serve my
turn,” he called to the host, who had just showed himself at the door of
the inn.
“By the Lord, this beast will not serve your turn!” Hugh cried hotly,
and, catching hold on Bayard’s bridle, flung himself before the horse in
time to confront the stranger. “This is no post-horse, sir, but mine
own.”
The other turned sharp away with a shrug of the shoulders; they were
broad shoulders, Hugh noted, and the rough gray coat fitted them ill.
“Put saddle to another horse at once,” the man bade.
“There is no other at hand, your Honor,” the host apologized, as he
ventured out into the court. “All are at the smith’s. Belike in a
half-hour, your Worship—”
“Enough,” the other interrupted him, and strode back to Hugh. “What will
you sell this beast for?” he asked curtly.
“Not again for all the gold in England,” Hugh replied, tightening his
grasp on the bridle.
“My faith, sir, I’ve no intent to knock you down and steal the horse,”
the other answered, with a short laugh.
His cool tone allayed the heat of Hugh’s anger sufficiently for him to
note the man more closely now, and he perceived he was not above three
or four and twenty, of a tall strong build, with sharp eyes. Hugh caught
his breath and stared frankly, while his mind jumped back to his first
day at Oxford, when he and Allestree, standing upon the steps, had
watched the king and his retinue ride by. The stranger had turned his
back upon him now, and drawn over to the centre of the court, but his
voice was loud, and Hugh could hear him bidding the hostler run out and
procure him a farm-horse or aught that went upon four legs. With a
sudden desperate impulse Hugh thrust forward and spoke boldly, “If it
like you, sir, you may have my horse now.”
“Your price?”
“No price. I’ll lend him unto you.”
“You’ve changed your tune quickly, sir,” said the man, coming back to
Bayard’s side.
“I’m thinking ’tis likely your business is of more weight than mine,
your Highness,” Hugh answered, in a tone that sank to a whisper.
“So you know me?” asked the stranger, with his foot already in the
stirrup.
“I can guess, sir.”
“Spare guessing, then, for taxing the brain,” retorted the other, as he
settled himself in the saddle. “Give me your name, though, sir; I’ll not
forget your service.”
Hugh hesitated an instant, then replied, “Hugh Gwyeth.”
“I’ve heard that name. Perhaps you’re kinsman to him that killed
Bellasis’ son?”
“I—I am the man that killed him, sir.”
“You? The deuce you are!” the stranger broke out; and, to Hugh’s
amazement, he did not look horrified, but more as if he were inclined to
laugh. “Come seek me to-morrow morning at my quarters,” he said
abruptly, then, gathering up the reins, went out of the inn yard at a
gallop.
Hugh stood gazing blankly after him, and could not decide whether to be
elated or dismayed, for he knew the stranger was Prince Rupert, and he
was to have audience with him next morning. Carry his cause to the king,
the widow had counselled him, Hugh reflected, and he tried to smile at
the remembrance, though his heart was sober and anxious.
Just there the host interrupted him; what was his pleasure now? Surely
he would not attempt to make his journey with the lame horse? “No, let
him rest,” Hugh ordered; “I’ll venture him in the morning. For now give
me a chamber; I’ll lie here this night.”
He was early astir next day, for, though the way to Oxford was short, he
was not sure of his mount, and, in any case, he was burning with desire
to present himself before the Prince and know the worst that was
destined for him. The white horse still went lame with a strained
fore-leg, but, sparing him as much as he could, Hugh contrived about
eleven of the clock to pace slowly into the city. Before he entered the
suburbs he had flung on his cloak, in spite of the heat, and pulled his
hat low on his forehead; but still he was nervously alert to avoid the
fixed gaze of those he met, and he dreaded any delay in the street. By
dint of such precautions, perhaps, he came at last unchallenged to
Christ Church, where he remembered Prince Rupert had his quarters.
The groom who took his bridle eyed him sharply, and, once across the
quadrangle and within the broad hall, a trig gentleman usher looked
askance at his worn boots and shabby buff coat. Hugh had too much upon
his mind, however, to trouble for his poor attire. He sat uneasily in
the great chair to which he had been motioned, and studied the sunlight
that fell from a long window high up toward the roof of the hall, till
the usher came at last to bid him follow. Hugh trudged obediently up a
great flight of stairs that creaked alarmingly, and, as he went,
wondered why there was an emptiness where his heart ought to be, and his
throat felt all choked up.
A great door was swung open, he remembered; then he was within a long
sunshiny chamber, with heavy table and big dark chairs, the usher had
gone, and he was left face to face with his Highness, the Prince, and
another youngish gentleman, who sat at opposite sides of the table with
a jumble of papers betwixt them. “You keep your time well, Master
Gwyeth,” spoke the Prince, and put by a paper like a map he had been
studying.
“Your Highness bade me,” Hugh stammered.
“So ’twas you killed Bellasis’ son,” the other repeated, still amusedly.
“Lay down that order, Grandison. I want you to have a look at this
desperate duellist.”
“That boy, your Highness?” drawled the man at the table.
The blood came hot into Hugh’s cheeks. “I pray your Highness, hang me,
if you will, but do not mock me,” he blurted out.
“Who speaks of hanging you here, lad?” Prince Rupert answered, in so
kindly a fashion that Hugh gazed at him in surprise. “Nay, had I my way,
I’d give a captaincy to every man who has the goodness to take off one
of these cursed civilians who are always holding our hands. You are of
the army, sir?”
“I hope to be, your Highness. I am only a volunteer now.”
“’Tis near enough for all soldiers to aid you as a fellow-soldier.—And
how think you, Grandison, my Lord Bellasis would take it, if this
gentleman received a free pardon?”
“He would deem himself most notably affronted,” the other answered
soberly.
Hugh made a step forward and let his words come fast: “If it be your
Highness’s will, if ’tis in your thought to aid me, I do entreat you,
let my case go, so far as it concerns me. But there is my friend that
went to the field with me, for my sake, and cared for me when I was ill
with my hurt afterward. He lost a commission because of me. If there is
only one can be pardoned, I beseech your Highness let it be he.”
“And how do they call this notable friend of yours?”
“Richard Strangwayes, your Highness. He was lieutenant in the regiment
of Sir William Pleydall.”
“Pleydall? Ah, your case was brought unto our notice two months back.
Ay, surely. Gwyeth and Strangwayes. Sir William Pleydall was urging your
pardon through a certain Captain Gwyeth who came to me.”
Hugh dropped his hand down on the back of a chair close by and griped it
hard, while he gazed blankly at the Prince, yet scarcely saw him.
Captain Gwyeth had been urging his pardon, he repeated over and over to
himself, yet could not make it comprehensible. Then he realized that his
Highness was speaking again, and he roused himself up to listen. “Two
months back that was. Well, there is time for many matters to change in
two months. Perchance your business can be settled for you, Master
Gwyeth. Only you must promise to fight no more duels,” the Prince added,
with a laugh in his sharp eyes.
“I will promise, your Highness,” Hugh answered soberly.
“And break it, I’ll wager. You were ready to draw your sword on a poor
dismounted traveller yesterday. Maybe you’d like to have back that horse
you’d not take all the gold in England for?”
“If it does please your Highness,” Hugh said politely; then added
honestly, “I should be loath to part with him.”
His Highness laughed outright. “Go to my stable and call for the horse,”
he bade. “Come hither again in a week or so, and there may be tidings
for you. Only see you do not come to court too often, Master Gwyeth;
’twould be a pity to spoil the honest blunt soldier you are like to be
with a slippery courtier polish.”
Then he turned again to his map in sign of dismissal, and Hugh somehow
contrived to bow himself safely through the door. He was out in the
green quadrangle before he got it through his head that Prince Rupert
himself would move for his pardon to the king, and then he recollected
he had not even said “thank you,” and he flushed hot with the
consciousness of his own churlishness.
It changed his thoughts a trifle to seek out his way to the stable and
claim Bayard, whom he had been ready to give up for lost and was
proportionately glad to recover. Once upon the horse’s back, he took
himself unostentatiously through the streets to the lodgings of his
fencing-master, de Sévérac, who received him warmly, when Hugh assured
him he was fairly sure of pardon and sought only to have quiet harborage
for the week. Those seven days he passed in the dingy sleeping-room
behind the fencing-hall, where he studied the pictures in a great French
folio, “L’Academie de l'Espee,” or entertained de Sévérac in his leisure
moments with a full account of the duel with Bellasis. The
fencing-master, who took a professional pride in his pupil’s success,
entreated Hugh not to persist in saying the victory was due solely to
Bellasis’ carelessness; ’twas just as easy to give credit to himself and
those who taught him the use of the rapier.
Thus the week dragged to an end, while Hugh counted the days
impatiently, and heard with terror that troops were setting out for
Bristol, for in the confusion the great men might well forget his
business. At last the seventh day came, and, having put on a clean shirt
and brushed his coat, he set out for Christ Church. As he went he tried
to steel himself against possible disappointment by telling over the
many cases of the ingratitude of kings; but at heart he knew he did not
believe so ill of the Prince, and in the end his trust was justified. He
had not been kept waiting many minutes in the great hall, when a trim
officer came from above-stairs, and, asking him if he were not named
Gwyeth, delivered to him a fair great piece of parchment all sealed up.
“’Tis my pardon?” Hugh burst out.
The other smiled, not unkindly. “The king of his clemency has been
pleased, at his Highness’s entreaty, to grant a full pardon to those who
had a hand in the death of Philip Bellasis,” he explained formally; then
added, “Suffer me congratulate you, Master Gwyeth.”
In a dazed fashion Hugh shook the other’s hand, then came forth from the
hall into the open air. There he paused, and pushed his hat well back on
his head so all could see his face, then, walking out into the South
Street, tramped half across the city. For he need not skulk nor shrink
now, he was a free man again; and how stoutly he meant to fight for
Prince Rupert, since he could show his gratitude in no other way. Then
it came over him that he were best post off at once to Tamworth and
thank Sir William Pleydall, who had first begun the movement to relieve
him, and thank Alan Gwyeth, who had been Sir William’s instrument. Hugh
scowled and walked a little slower.
But still all his friends lay at Tamworth, and he would speed a letter
thence to tell Dick the good news; so in the end he made briskly for his
quarters. Taking time first to hale out de Sévérac to a fine dinner at
an ordinary, where they ate under the full gaze of the town, he got to
horse, and, ere mid-afternoon, trotted forth from the city. He
calculated he would make the “Bear and Ragged Staff” just about dusk,
and, true enough, he rode down the village street while the red flush of
the sunset still lingered in the west.
Inside the court of the inn he saw five horses standing, stripped of
accoutrements and already half rubbed down by the hostler and his groom.
“Take this beast of mine in to make the half-dozen,” Hugh bade, and,
dismounting, walked leisurely across the court to the side door. His
eyes travelled above the door to an open lattice, and, as he gazed, like
the flash of a face in a dream, he had sight of Dick Strangwayes.
For an instant Hugh stood petrified while he took in each
detail,—Strangwayes’ clean-shaven jaw, the sweep of mustache, the
bandage about his forehead, even the way in which he leaned heavily at
the window, resting one hand against the casement; then he sprang
forward, crying, “Dick!”
Right on that Strangwayes flung himself forward half out at the
casement, and shouted, “Into the saddle and off with you, off with you!”