another. More and more often now they met these solitary giants, till
their view began to be obscured by them. The road dwindled till it was
no better than a track, the earth beside it was wild and rocky;
Rodriguez wondered to what manner of land he was coming. But
continually the branches of some tree obscured his view and the only
indication he had of it was from the road he trod, which seemed to tell
him that men came here seldom. Beyond every huge tree that they passed
as they went downhill Rodriguez hoped to get a better view, but always
there stood another to close the vista. It was some while before he
realised that he had entered a forest. They were come to Shadow Valley.
The grandeur of this place, penetrated by shafts of sunlight, coloured
by flashes of floating butterflies, filled by the chaunt of birds
rising over the long hum of insects, lifted the fallen spirits of
Rodriguez as he walked on through the morning.
He still would not have exchanged his rose for the whole forest; but in
the mighty solemnity of the forest his mourning for the lady that he
feared he had lost no longer seemed the only solemn thing: indeed, the
sombre forest seemed well attuned to his mood; and what complaint have
we against Fate wherever this is so. His mood was one of tragic loss,
the defeat of an enterprise that his hopes had undertaken, to seize
victory on the apex of the world, to walk all his days only just
outside the edge of Paradise, for no less than that his hopes and his
first love promised each other; and then he walked despairing in small
rain. In this mood Fate had led him to solemn old oaks standing huge
among shadows; and the grandeur of their grey grip on the earth that
had been theirs for centuries was akin to the grandeur of the high
hopes he had had, and his despair was somehow soothed by the shadows.
And then the impudent birds seemed to say "Hope again."
They walked for miles into the forest and lit a fire before noon, for
Rodriguez had left Lowlight very early. And by it Morano cooked bacon
again and dried his master's cloak. They ate the bacon and sat by the
fire till all their clothes were dry, and when the flames from the
great logs fell and only embers glowed they sat there still, with hands
spread to the warmth of the embers; for to those who wander a fire is
food and rest and comfort. Only as the embers turned grey did they
throw earth over their fire and continue their journey. Their road grew
smaller and the forest denser.
They had walked some miles from the place where they lit their fire,
when a somewhat unmistakable sound made Rodriguez look ahead of him. An
arrow had struck a birch tree on the right side, ten or twelve paces in
front of him; and as he looked up another struck it from the opposite
side just level with the first; the two were sticking in it ten feet or
so from the ground. Rodriguez drew his sword. But when a third arrow
went over his head from behind and struck the birch tree, whut! just
between the other two, he perceived, as duller minds could have done,
that it was a hint, and he returned his sword and stood still. Morano
questioned his master with his eyes, which were asking what was to be
done next. But Rodriguez shrugged his shoulders: there was no fighting
with an invisible foe that could shoot like that. That much Morano
knew, but he did not know that there might not be some law of Chivalry
that would demand that Rodriguez should wave his sword in the air or
thrust at the birch tree until someone shot him. When there seemed to
be no such rule Morano was well content. And presently men came quietly
on to the road from different parts of the wood. They were dressed in
brown leather and wore leaf-green hats, and round each one's neck hung
a disk of engraved copper. They came up to the travellers carrying
bows, and the leader said to Rodriguez:
"Señor, all travellers here bring tribute to the King of Shadow
Valley," at the mention of whom all touched hats and bowed their heads.
"What do you bring us?"
Rodriguez thought of no answer; but after a moment he said, for the
sake of loyalty: "I know one king only."
"There is only one king in Shadow Valley," said the bowman.
"He brings a tribute of emeralds," said another, looking at Rodriguez'
scabbard. And then they searched him and others search Morano. There
were eight or nine of them, all in their leaf-green hats, with ribbons
round their necks of the same colour to hold the copper disks. They
took a gold coin from Morano and grey greasy pieces of silver. One of
them took his frying-pan; but he looked so pitifully at them as he said
simply, "I starve," that the frying-pan was restored to him.
They unbuckled Rodriguez' belt and took from him sword and scabbard and
three gold pieces from his purse. Next they found the gold piece that
was hanging round his neck, still stuffed inside his clothes where he
had put it when he was riding. Having examined it they put it back
inside his clothes, while the leader rebuckled his sword-belt about his
waist and returned him his three gold-pieces.
Others returned his money to Morano. "Master," said the leader, bowing
to Rodriguez, his green hat in hand, "under our King, the forest is
yours."
Morano was pleased to hear this respect paid to his master, but
Rodriguez was so surprised that he who was never curt without reason
found no more to say than "Why?"
"Because we are your servants," said the other.
"Who are you?" asked Rodriguez.
"We are the green bowmen, master," he said, "who hold this forest
against all men for our King."
"And who is he?" said Rodriguez.
And the bowman answered: "The King of Shadow Valley," at which the
others all touched hats and bowed heads again. And Rodriguez seeing
that the mystery would grow no clearer for any information to be had
from them said: "Conduct me to your king."
"That, master, we cannot do," said the chief of the bowmen. "There be
many trees in this forest, and behind any one of them he holds his
court. When he needs us there is his clear horn. But when men need him
who knows which shadow is his of all that lie in the forest?" Whether
or not there was anything interesting in the mystery, to Rodriguez it
was merely annoying; and finding it grew no clearer he turned his
attention to shelter for the night, to which all travellers give a
thought at least once, between noon and sunset.
"Is there any house on this road, señor," he said, "in which we could
rest the night?"
"Ten miles from here," said he, "and not far from the road you take is
the best house we have in the forest. It is yours, master, for as long
as you honour it."
"Come then," said Rodriguez, "and I thank you, señor."
So they all started together, Rodriguez with the leader going in front
and Morano following with all the bowmen. And soon the bowmen were
singing songs of the forest, hunting songs, songs of the winter; and
songs of the long summer evenings, songs of love. Cheered by this
merriment, the miles slipped by.
And Rodriguez gathered from the songs they sang something of what they
were and of how they lived in the forest, living amongst the woodland
creatures till these men's ways were almost as their ways; killing what
they needed for food but protecting the woodland things against all
others; straying out amongst the villages in summer evenings, and
always welcome; and owning no allegiance but to the King of the Shadow
Valley.
And the leader told Rodriguez that his name was Miguel Threegeese,
given him on account of an exploit in his youth when he lay one night
with his bow by one of the great pools in the forest, where the geese
come in winter. He said the forest was a hundred miles long, lying
mostly along a great valley, which they were crossing. And once they
had owned allegiance to kings of Spain, but now to none but the King of
the Shadow Valley, for the King of Spain's men had once tried to cut
some of the forest down, and the forest was sacred.
Behind him the men sang on of woodland things, and of cottage gardens
in the villages: with singing and laughter they came to their journey's
end. A cottage as though built by peasants with boundless material
stood in the forest. It was a thatched cottage built in the peasant's
way but of enormous size. The leader entered first and whispered to
those within, who rose and bowed to Rodriguez as he entered, twenty
more bowmen who had been sitting at a table. One does not speak of the
banqueting-hall of a cottage, but such it appeared, for it occupied
more than half of the cottage and was as large as the banqueting-hall
of any castle. It was made of great beams of oak, and high at either
end just under the thatch were windows with their little square panes
of bulging bluish glass, which at that time was rare in Spain. A table
of oak ran down the length of it, cut from a single tree, polished and
dark from the hands of many men that had sat at it. Boar spears hung on
the wall, great antlers and boar's tusks and, carved in the oak of the
wall and again on a high, dark chair that stood at the end of the long
table empty, a crown with oak leaves that Rodriguez recognised. It was
the same as the one that was cut on his gold coin, which he had given
no further thought to, riding to Lowlight, and which the face of
Serafina had driven from his mind altogether. "But," he said, and then
was silent, thinking to learn more by watching than by talking. And his
companions of the road came in and all sat down on the benches beside
the ample table, and a brew was brought, a kind of pale mead, that they
called forest water. And all drank; and, sitting at the table, watching
them more closely than he could as he walked in the forest, Rodriguez
saw by the sunlight that streamed in low through one window that on the
copper disks they wore round their necks on green ribbon the design was
again the same. It was much smaller than his on the gold coin but the
same strange leafy crown. "Wear it as you go through Shadow Valley," he
now seemed to remember the man saying to him who put it round his neck.
But why? Clearly because it was the badge of this band of men. And this
other man was one of them.
His eyes strayed back to the great design on the wall. "The crown of
the forest," said Miguel as he saw his eyes wondering at it, "as you
doubtless know, señor."
Why should he know? Of course because he bore the design himself. "Who
wears it?" said Rodriguez.
"The King of Shadow Valley."
Morano was without curiosity; he did not question good drink; he sat at
the table with a cup of horn in his hand, as happy as though he had
come to his master's castle, though that had not yet been won.
The sun sank under the oaks, filling the hall with a ruddy glow,
turning the boar spears scarlet and reddening the red faces of the
merry men of the bow.
A dozen of the men went out; to relieve the guard in the forest, Miguel
explained. And Rodriguez learned that he had come through a line of
sentries without ever seeing one. Presently a dozen others came in from
their posts and unslung their bows and laid them on pegs on the wall
and sat down at the table. Whereat there were whispered words and they
all rose and bowed to Rodriguez. And Rodriguez had caught the words "A
prince of the forest." What did it mean?
Soon the long hall grew dim, and his love for the light drew Rodriguez
out to watch the sunset. And there was the sun under indescribable
clouds, turning huge and yellow among the trunks of the trees and
casting glory munificently down glades. It set, and the western sky
became blood-red and lilac: from the other end of the sky the moon
peeped out of night. A hush came and a chill, and a glory of colour,
and a dying away of light; and in the hush the mystery of the great
oaks became magical. A blackbird blew a tune less of this earth than of
fairy-land.
Rodriguez wished that he could have had a less ambition than to win a
castle in the wars, for in those glades and among those oaks he felt
that happiness might be found under roofs of thatch. But having come by
his ambition he would not desert it.
Now rushlights were lit in the great cottage and the window of the long
room glowed yellow. A fountain fell in the stillness that he had not
heard before. An early nightingale tuned a tentative note. "The forest
is fair, is it not?" said Miguel.
Rodriguez had no words to say. To turn into words the beauty that was
now shining in his thoughts, reflected from the evening there, was no
easier than for wood to reflect all that is seen in the mirror.
"You love the forest," he said at last.
"Master," said Miguel, "it is the only land in which we should live our
days. There are cities and roads but man is not meant for them. I know
not, master, what God intends about us; but in cities we are against
the intention at every step, while here, why, we drift along with it."
"I, too, would live here always," said Rodriguez.
"The house is yours," said Miguel. And Rodriguez answered: "I go
tomorrow to the wars."
They turned round then and walked slowly back to the cottage, and
entered the candlelight and the loud talk of many men out of the hush
of the twilight. But they passed from the room at once by a door on the
left, and came thus to a large bedroom, the only other room in the
cottage.
"Your room, master," said Miguel Threegeese.
It was not so big as the hall where the bowmen sat, but it was a goodly
room. The bed was made of carved wood, for there were craftsmen in the
forest, and a hunt went all the way round it with dogs and deer. Four
great posts held a canopy over it: they were four young birch-trees
seemingly still wearing their bright bark, but this had been painted on
their bare timber by some woodland artist. The chairs had not the
beauty of the great ages of furniture, but they had a dignity that the
age of commerce has not dreamed of. Each one was carved out of a single
block of wood: there was no join in them anywhere. One of them lasts to
this day.
The skins of deer covered the long walls. There were great basins and
jugs of earthenware. All was forest-made. The very shadows whispering
among themselves in corners spoke of the forest. The room was rude; but
being without ornament, except for the work of simple craftsmen, it had
nothing there to offend the sense of right of anyone entering its door,
by any jarring conflict with the purposes and traditions of the land in
which it stood. All the woodland spirits might have entered there, and
slept--if spirits sleep--in the great bed, and left at dawn unoffended.
In fact that age had not yet learned vulgarity.
When Miguel Threegeese left Morano entered.
"Master," he said, "they are making a banquet for you."
"Good," said Rodriguez. "We will eat it." And he waited to hear what
Morano had come to say, for he could see that it was more than this.
"Master," said Morano, "I have been talking with the bowman. And they
will give you whatever you ask. They are good people, master, and they
will give you all things, whatever you asked of them."
Rodriguez would not show to his servant that it all still puzzled him.
"They are very amiable men," he said.
"Master," said Morano, coming to the point, "that Garda, they will have
walked after us. They must be now in Lowlight. They have all to-night
to get new shoes on their horses. And to-morrow, master, to-morrow, if
we be still on foot..."
Rodriguez was thinking. Morano seemed to him to be talking sense.
"You would like another ride?" he said to Morano.
"Master," he answered, "riding is horrible. But the public garrotter,
he is a bad thing too." And he meditatively stroked the bristles under
his chin.
"They would give us horses?" said Rodriguez.
"Anything, master, I am sure of it. They are good people."
"They'll have news of the road by which they left Lowlight," said
Rodriguez reflectively. "They say la Garda dare not enter the forest,"
Morano continued, "but thirty miles from here the forest ends. They
could ride round while we go through."
"They would give us horses?" said Rodriguez again.
"Surely," said Morano.
And then Rodriguez asked where they cooked the banquet, since he saw
that there were only two rooms in the great cottage and his inquiring
eye saw no preparations for cooking about the fireplace of either. And
Morano pointed through a window at the back of the room to another
cottage among the trees, fifty paces away. A red glow streamed from its
windows, growing strong in the darkening forest.
"That is their kitchen, master," he said. "The whole house is kitchen."
His eyes looked eagerly at it, for, though he loved bacon, he welcomed
the many signs of a dinner of boundless variety.
As he and his master returned to the long hall great plates of polished
wood were being laid on the table. They gave Rodriguez a place on the
right of the great chair that had the crown of the forest carved on the
back.
"Whose chair is that?" said Rodriguez.
"The King of Shadow Valley," they said.
"He is not here then," said Rodriguez.
"Who knows?" said a bowman.
"It is his chair," said another; "his place is ready. None knows the
ways of the King of Shadow Valley."
"He comes sometimes at this hour," said a third, "as the boar comes to
Heather Pool at sunset. But not always. None knows his ways."
"If they caught the King," said another, "the forest would perish. None
loves it as he, none knows its ways as he, no other could so defend it."
"Alas," said Miguel, "some day when he be not here they will enter the
forest." All knew whom he meant by they. "And the goodly trees will
go." He spoke as a man foretelling the end of the world; and, as men to
whom no less was announced, the others listened to him. They all loved
Shadow Valley.
In this man's time, so they told Rodriguez, none entered the forest to
hurt it, no tree was cut except by his command, and venturous men
claiming rights from others than him seldom laid axe long to tree
before he stood near, stepping noiselessly from among shadows of trees
as though he were one of their spirits coming for vengeance on man.
All this they told Rodriguez, but nothing definite they told of their
king, where he was yesterday, where he might be now; and any questions
he asked of such things seemed to offend a law of the forest.
And then the dishes were carried in, to Morano's great delight: with
wide blue eyes he watched the produce of that mighty estate coming in
through the doorway cooked. Boars' heads, woodcock, herons, plates full
of fishes, all manner of small eggs, a roe-deer and some rabbits, were
carried in by procession. And the men set to with their ivory-handled
knives, each handle being the whole tusk of a boar. And with their
eating came merriment and tales of past huntings and talk of the forest
and stories of the King of Shadow Valley.
And always they spoke of him not only with respect but also with the
discretion, Rodriguez thought, of men that spoke of one who might be
behind them at that moment, and one who tolerated no trifling with his
authority. Then they sang songs again, such as Rodriguez had heard on
the road, and their merry lives passed clearly before his mind again,
for we live in our songs as no men live in histories. And again
Rodriguez lamented his hard ambition and his long, vague journey,
turning away twice from happiness; once in the village of Lowlight
where happiness deserted him, and here in the goodly forest where he
jilted happiness. How well could he and Morano live as two of this
band, he thought; leaving all cares in cities: for there dwelt cares in
cities even then. Then he put the thought away. And as the evening wore
away with merry talk and with song, Rodriguez turned to Miguel and told
him how it was with la Garda and broached the matter of horses. And
while the others sang Miguel spoke sadly to him. "Master," he said, "la
Garda shall never take you in Shadow Valley, yet if you must leave us
to make your fortune in the wars, though your fortune waits you here,
there be many horses in the forest, and you and your servant shall have
the best."
"Tomorrow morning, señor?" said Rodriguez.
"Even so," said Miguel.
"And how shall I send them to you again?" said Rodriguez.
"Master, they are yours," said Miguel.
But this Rodriguez would not have, for as yet he only guessed what
claim at all he had upon Shadow Valley, his speculations being far more
concerned with the identity of the hidalgo that he had fought the night
before, how he concerned Serafina, who had owned the rose that he
carried: in fact his mind was busy with such studies as were proper to
his age. And at last they decided between them on the house of a
lowland smith, who was the furthest man that the bowmen knew who was
secretly true to their king. At his house Rodriguez and Morano should
leave the horses. He dwelt sixty miles from the northern edge of the
forest, and would surely give Rodriguez fresh horses if he possessed
them, for he was a true man to the bowman. His name was Gonzalez and he
dwelt in a queer green house.
They turned then to listen a moment to a hunting song that all the
bowmen were singing about the death of a boar. Its sheer merriment
constrained them. Then Miguel spoke again. "You should not leave the
forest," he said sadly.
Rodriguez sighed: it was decided. Then Miguel told him of his road,
which ran north-eastward and would one day bring him out of Spain. He
told him how towns on the way, and the river Ebro, and with awe and
reverence he spoke of the mighty Pyrenees. And then Rodriguez rose, for
the start was to be at dawn, and walked quietly through the singing out
of the hall to the room where the great bed was. And soon he slept, and
his dreams joined in the endless hunt through Shadow Valley that was
carved all round the timbers of his bed.
All too soon he heard voices, voices far off at first, to which he drew
nearer and nearer; thus he woke grudgingly out of the deeps of sleep.
It was Miguel and Morano calling him.
When at length he reached the hall all the merriment of the evening was
gone from it but the sober beauty of the forest flooded in through both
windows with early sunlight and bird-song; so that it had not the sad
appearance of places in which we have rejoiced, when we revisit them
next day or next generation and find them all deserted by dance and
song.
Rodriguez ate his breakfast while the bowmen waited with their bows all
strung by the door. When he was ready they all set off in the early
light through the forest.
Rodriguez did not criticise his ambition; it sailed too high above his
logic for that; but he regretted it, as he went through the beauty of
the forest among these happy men. But we must all have an ambition, and
Rodriguez stuck to the one he had. He had another, but it was an
ambition with weak wings that could not come to hope. It depended upon
the first. If he could win a castle in the wars he felt that he might
even yet hope towards Lowlight.
Little was said, and Rodriguez was all alone with his thoughts. In two
hours they met a bowman holding two horses. They had gone eight miles.
"Farewell to the forest," said Miguel to Rodriguez. There was almost a
query in his voice. Would Rodriguez really leave them? it seemed to say.
"Farewell," he answered.
Morano too had looked sideways towards his master, seeming almost to
wonder what his answer would be: when it came he accepted it and walked
to the horses. Rodriguez mounted: willing hands helped up Morano.
"Farewell," said Miguel once more. And all the bowmen shouted
"Farewell."
"Make my farewell," said Rodriguez, "to the King of Shadow Valley."
A twig cracked in the forest.
"Hark," said Miguel. "Maybe that was a boar."
"I cannot wait to hunt," said Rodriguez, "for I have far to go."
"Maybe," said Miguel, "it was the King's farewell to you."
Rodriguez looked into the forest and saw nothing.
"Farewell," he said again. The horses were fresh and he let his go.
Morano lumbered behind him. In two miles they came to the edge of the
forest and up a rocky hill, and so to the plains again, and one more
adventure lay behind them. Rodriguez turned round once on the high
ground and took a long look back on the green undulations of peace. The
forest slept there as though empty of men.
Then they rode. In the first hour, easily cantering, they did ten
miles. Then they settled down to what those of our age and country and
occupation know as a hound-jog, which is seven miles an hour. And after
two hours they let the horses rest. It was the hour of the frying-pan.
Morano, having dismounted, stretched himself dolefully; then he brought
out all manner of meats. Rodriguez looked wonderingly at them.
"For the wars, master," said Morano. To whatever wars they went, the
green bowmen seemed to have supplied an ample commissariat.