The part of Yorkshire which they had been traversing abounded in
rivers. The Wharfe and the Aire, the first of which joins the Ouse
eight miles south, and the second eighteen miles southeast of York,
they had already crossed. They were now near the Went, and here, as
Hugo discovered the next morning, it was Humphrey's decision to stay a
day or two.
"I go no further without a dream," he declared. "Last night I slept too
sound to have one. And moreover I wish not to fall in with these
galloping king's men. Let them ride up and down till they think us
securely hid away in some religious house, since they find us not in
the wood. So shall we go the safer on our way to Doncaster."
Hugo had thought much the evening before, and he had resolved to
dispute Humphrey in future no more than was necessary. For he now saw
that, though he was but a serving-man, Humphrey knew more of Yorkshire
woods than his master. He therefore made no objection when Humphrey
announced his decision, much to the serving-man's surprise, for he had
expected opposition. Finding none, he enlarged his air of importance,
and bade Hugo stay where he was while he took the horses down to the
stream for water.
Hugo, putting a strong restraint on himself, obeyed, and was rewarded
on the serving-man's return with the promise that, as soon as the dog
came in and was tied, he might venture forth with Humphrey to explore
the region.
"Thou must know," remarked Humphrey, "that we be on the high bank. On
the other side of the valley sloping coppices abound, and therein can I
show thee many badger holes. Hast ever seen a badger hunt?"
"Nay," answered Hugo.
"I was but twenty years old," continued Humphrey, "when first I came
through these woods, and on the bank across the valley from this point
I did see a badger hunt. Three men and two dogs did I see, and they
five did at length dig out one badger. The old badger was inside the
hole taking his sleep, for it was ten o'clock in the morning. And a
badger not only sleepeth all day in summer, but day and night in
winter. Thou knowest that?"
"Yea," replied Hugo. And added that at his uncle's priory he had
occasionally eaten badger meat, which was very good.
"Cured like ham, was it?" inquired Humphrey.
"Yea," responded Hugo.
Humphrey nodded his head approvingly. "A priest," he said, "for knowing
and having good eating."
The two sat silent a few moments waiting for Fleetfoot, who did not
come, and then Humphrey continued: "The badger hath a thick skin. He
goeth into a wasp's nest or a bees' nest, and the whole swarm may sting
him and he feeleth it not."
"What doth the badger in wasps' nests and bees' nests?" inquired Hugo.
"Why, he will eat up their grubs. The eggs make footless grubs, and
these the badger eateth. My grandsire went a journey through this wood
once on a moonlight night. He rode slowly along, and at a certain place
was a bees' nest beside the path, and there, full in the moonlight, was
a badger rooting out the nest. Out swarmed the bees, and several did
sting the horse of my grandsire at the moment when he had taken good
aim at the badger with his stick. The horse bolted, and my grandsire
found himself lying in the path with his neck all but broken, and the
bees taking vengeance on him for the trespass of the badger. He hath
had no liking to bees or badgers since that day."
"He still liveth, then?" asked Hugo.
"Ay," returned Humphrey, much pleased at the question. "Hale and hearty
he is, and ninety-six years of age."
By common consent both now paused to listen for Fleetfoot. Hearing
nothing Humphrey continued, "Didst ever see a tame badger?"
"Nay," was the reply.
"A badger becometh as tame as a dog, if he be taken young. Report hath
it that there is great sport in London at the public houses baiting the
badger. I know not how it may be."
And now Fleetfoot came. Not joyfully, but slinking, for he knew he had
been doing wrong. Three partridges, a fox, and a badger he had slain
since Humphrey had seen him, and he wore a guilty look.
"Thou wilt do no more than tie him with the willow thong," observed
Humphrey, eyeing Fleetfoot with disfavor. "Were he mine, I should beat
him. The king maketh nothing of lopping off a man's hand or foot for
such a trespass, or even putting out of his eyes. And should the
keepers discover what he hath done, it were all the same as if we had
done it."
"Nay, Humphrey," said Hugo, smoothing the dog's head. "Perchance he
hath taken no more than the partridge thou sawest."
For answer Humphrey struck lightly the dog's rounded-out side. "Tell me
not," he said, "that one partridge hath such a filling power. Else
would I feed only on partridges. Moreover, he is a knowing dog, and see
how he slinketh. He would not be that cast down for one partridge, I
warrant thee."
"It may be thou art right," replied Hugo, as he tied up Fleetfoot.
"Yea, that I may be," returned Humphrey, importantly. "A man that hath
dreams of going up a ladder and climbing a tree in the same night is
most likely to be right when it cometh to measuring up the trespasses
of a straying deerhound. For why should a man be advanced to preferment
and honor except that he hath merit? And to dream of going up a ladder
and climbing a tree is sure warrant that he hath it. And now fare we
forth to see this Brockadale."
Hugo having finished tying Fleetfoot securely with a tether so short
that he could not gnaw through it, followed Humphrey, and the dog
attempted to follow Hugo, much to Humphrey's satisfaction. "Ay, thou
wouldst follow, wouldst thou?" he said. "Bide where thou art with the
horses, and think on thy evil deeds." Then turning to the boy he added,
"If thou wilt not beat him, Hugo, my chiding may do him some good."
It was a most beautiful little valley that the boy saw when he stood on
the edge of a hill on its northern side and gazed down into it, while
Humphrey stood by pointing out its features with the air of a
proprietor. Green and lovely it stretched away to the southeast some
two miles, as Humphrey told him. Through it flowed the Went, bending
and turning, its banks lined with osiers and willows. Wooded hills were
the northern, and sloping coppices the southern boundary of the vale.
The two had not ventured out into the open. They were still in the
shelter of the trees. "The Normans rule, and honest men must skulk and
hide," observed Humphrey, with some bitterness.
"Lord De Aldithely is a Norman," remarked Hugo. "So also am I."
"Ay," rejoined Humphrey, "but all Normans are not alike bad. Thou art
not the king, moreover, nor is my lord, who is an honest man and
standeth bravely by the people, and is opposed to murder and robbery.
Therefore is he fled, and therefore is our young lord Josceline in
danger, and therefore are we skulking and hiding and leading the king's
men this chase. The times be evil; and who knoweth what shall amend
them?"
Hugo did not reply. His eye had caught sight of the flash of sunlight
on steel down the valley, and he pointed it out to Humphrey.
"Up! up!" cried Humphrey. "Up into yon spreading oak at the edge of the
vale. There shall we be concealed, and yet see all."
"They come from toward Doncaster, do they not?" asked Hugo when they
were safely out of sight among the branches.
"Ay," answered Humphrey. "Nor was it for naught that I did sleep too
sound to dream last night, else might we have been on the way to
Doncaster, and so, perchance, have met them."
The party drew nearer, and soon the keen eyes of Humphrey and Hugo
resolved them into three men-at-arms led by Walter Skinner.
"Three soldiers and a king's man to take a boy and a man!" laughed
Humphrey. "It must be that they have a good opinion of our bravery."
"Or of thy cunning," said Hugo, to whom Humphrey had a short while
before revealed all that had befallen him in Ferrybridge.
"Oh, ay," answered Humphrey, complacently. "I have my share, no doubt.
A man doth not live forty years with treachery on all sides of him and
learn nothing. My head had been off my shoulders ere this, had not
some measure of cunning done its part to keep it on. They will beat up
the whole forest hereabout for us, I doubt not. If I get a good dream
to-night, we go on to-morrow."
Hugo smiled. He thought it strange that a man so sensible, in many
respects, as Humphrey should pin such faith to dreams. So he said
teasingly: "How if thou get not the dream to-night, nor yet to-morrow
night? Do we bide here until the dream come, if that be next
Michaelmas?"
The serving-man seemed puzzled. Then he answered: "Nay, to be sure.
Then would the summer be done; and, moreover, I never went so long
without the right dream in my life."
Nearer and nearer drew the horsemen until, in the vale just opposite
and below Hugo and Humphrey, they dismounted. "Here do we stop," said
Walter Skinner. "I warrant you they be hereabouts, else have the fat
priests lied when they denied they were in abbey and priory."
"Ay," answered one of the men-at-arms. "They be hereabouts, no doubt,
if they be not farther to the east, when thy fellow will catch them if
we miss them. I marvel thou hast not come up with them before now. Thou
sayest this is the third day of their flight?"
This seeming to reflect on the ability of the pompous little Walter
Skinner, he frowned. And drawing himself up importantly he said, "The
young lord hath to his servant a Saxon who knoweth well these parts."
"Some deer-stealer, without doubt," observed the man-at-arms.
"And he goeth not straight forward," continued Walter Skinner, "else
had I met him. But he creepeth here, and hideth there, and goeth in
retired paths."
"And all to balk thee!" said the big man-at-arms, regarding with scarce
concealed contempt the little strutting spy.
There was that in the manner of the man-at-arms that nettled Walter
Skinner, so that he became more pompous than before and, resolved to
show the soldier how high he stood in the king's counsel, he said
haughtily: "Why, it were best he balk me, if he knew what will come to
his young master when I find him. King John, as thou knowest, hath a
special hatred toward his father, Lord De Aldithely."
"De Aldithely, sayest thou?" interrupted the man-at-arms.
"Ay, and he is resolved the son shall not live, no more than his own
nephew Arthur."
"And he will put him to death?" asked the man-at-arms.
"Why, not speedily," answered Walter Skinner, importantly, "but cat and
mouse fashion, by which he will be the longer dying, and his father the
more tormented. He will speedily give orders also to raze his castle as
a nest of traitors."
"Whence hadst thou this?" demanded the man-at-arms.
Walter Skinner stood off and looked at him. Then, with an air of great
mystery, he said: "It is whispered about. I may not say more. It
becometh me not."
The man-at-arms now rose from the ground where he had thrown himself
and mounted his horse. "I seek not the young lord," he said. "I betray
no mouse to the cat, least of all the son of the brave De Aldithely. I
will back to my own master from whom thou didst borrow me. I will say
thou needest me not and hast bid me return. When thou art tired of thy
life, say thou otherwise." And he looked meaningly at him.
"I go with thee," said the second man-at-arms, springing from the
ground.
"And I also!" exclaimed the third.
In vain Walter Skinner tried to restrain them. They clattered off down
the valley whence they had come, and were soon out of sight on their
way to Doncaster.
The sound carried well here; the voices of the men were loud; and Hugo
and Humphrey, whose ears were keen, heard with consternation all that
passed. "I fear it meaneth death to thee also if thou be caught," said
Humphrey. "For it is a serious thing to dupe a man of the king's rage.
This calleth for dreams, and that right speedily, if we are not to fall
into his hands."
The disappointed Walter Skinner made no attempt to depart. "Here will I
stay a while," he said, "and berate the folly that did tell them the
purpose of the king and the name of the young lord. I did think to
raise myself in authority over them by showing that I did know the
king's counsel, and, in so doing, I did forget that for murdering of
Arthur all men hate him, and few will help him to his will upon
others." Moodily he threw himself upon the grass, having staked his
horse, and soon left off berating himself by falling into a sound
sleep. The sun reached the meridian, and he still slept. It came to be
mid-afternoon and still he moved not, for he had ridden hard and had
been deprived of his rest the night before. His tethered horse at last
whinnied softly and then loudly. And, to the dismay of Hugo and
Humphrey, he was answered by their own horses in the thicket. But still
the king's man moved not.
"Would that I knew certainly that he sleepeth," said Humphrey,
anxiously. "For then we might come down and escape."
"Nay, nay," objected Hugo, earnestly. "Seest thou not how a little
sound goeth far here? The rustling of the leaves and rattling of the
boughs as we descend might awake him."
Humphrey looked at him. "Ay, poor mouse!" he said. "Mayhap thou art
right."
And now Walter Skinner stirred in his slumber. Once more his horse
whinnied loudly. Once more the horses in the thicket answered; and the
spy, broad awake, sprang to his feet. "Aha, Fortune!" he cried, "thou
art with me."
"Nevertheless," observed Humphrey, softly, "if thou hast not dreamed of
going up a ladder and climbing a tree, all may not go so well with thee
as thou thinkest."
Leaving his horse, the spy climbed the wooded hill, at the top of which
he paused just under the oak in which Hugo and Humphrey were concealed.
The horses whinnied no more, though he waited a few moments hoping to
hear them. "I will on," he cried impatiently. "'Twas from this
direction the answer came." And away he hurried on foot, for he
imagined that those he sought were hidden near at hand, and waiting for
the night to come ere they resumed their journey. He knew that he alone
could not capture them, but if he could get on their trail and dog them
unseen till he could get help he would be sure of them.
As soon as the spy was out of sight Humphrey began to descend the tree.
"Whither goest thou?" asked Hugo.
"Thou shalt see," returned Humphrey.
With speed he ran down the hill, breaking a switch of birch as he ran.
He hastened to Walter Skinner's horse, cut him loose from his tether,
and struck him sharply with the birch rod. Away galloped the horse down
the valley, while Humphrey hastened back to his place in the tree.
"Fortune may be with him," he said to Hugo, "but his horse is not.
Mayhap I need not another dream, for, by the one I had, I think we have
got the better of him. Moreover, there will be no more whinnying for
our horses to answer."