"A DEVIL OF A WOMAN."
"From all such devils, good Lord, deliver us!"--_The Taming of the
Shrew._
"And now, my men, upon him!" cried Mistress Hazlehurst, backing to make
room in which her followers might obey.
These followers tried to push forward; the horses crowded one another,
and there ensued much huddling and confusion. But the lantern-bearer,
holding his light and his bridle in one hand, caught Mr. Marryott's
bridle with the other. Hal struck this hand down with one of his
pistols, which were not prepared for firing. He then drew his sword,
with a gesture that threw hesitation into the ranks of his opposers.
"Madam," he cried, in no very gentle tone, "may I know what is your
purpose in this?"
"'Tis to prevent your flight," she called back, promptly. "The officers
of justice are slow; I shall see that you forestall them not."
For a moment Hal, thinking only of the officers behind him, wondered if
she could have heard of the council's intention, and whether it was to
the royal messengers that she alluded.
"What have officers of justice to do with me?" he asked.
"To call you to account for the killing of my brother!"
Sir Valentine's fight, in which wounds had been given on both sides,
again recurred to Hal's mind.
"Your brother is dead, then?" he inquired.
"I am but now from his funeral!" was her answer.
In that case, Hal deduced, her brother must have died two days before,
that is to say, on the very day of the fight. The news must have come
belated to the sister, for she had been at the performance of "Hamlet,"
yesterday. And here was explanation of her departure from the theatre in
the midst of the play. The summons to her dead brother's side had
followed her to the playhouse, and there overtaken her. Afterward, Hal
found these inferences to be correct.
For a second or two of mutual inaction, he marvelled at the strange ways
of circumstance which had brought this woman, whom he had yesterday
admired in the crowded London playhouse, to confront him in such odd
relations on this lonely, night-hidden road in Hertfordshire. But a
sound that a turn of the wind brought--the sound of Roger Barnet's men
riding nearer--sharpened him to the necessity of immediate action
against this sudden hindrance. Yet he felt loath to go from this woman.
Go he must, however, though even at the possible cost of violence to her
people.
The Puritan retained his place at Marryott's side. Kit Bottle was close
behind, and with horse already half turned so that he might face
Barnet's men should they come up too soon; he had drawn his sword, and
was quietly making ready his pistols.
"Madam," said Hal, decisively, "I did not kill your brother. Now, by
your favor, I will pass, for I am in some haste."
"What!" she cried. "Did you lie just now, when you said you were Sir
Valentine Fleetwood?"
Now, Hal might tell her that he was not Sir Valentine; but, doubtless,
she would not believe him; and thus the situation would not be changed.
And, on the other hand, if she should believe him, so much the
worse,--she would then bend her energies toward the hindrance of the
real Sir Valentine; would ride on toward Fleetwood house, be met and
questioned by Roger Barnet, and set him right, or at least cause him to
send a party back to Fleetwood house to investigate. So Hal's purpose
would be speedily frustrated. His only course was to let her think him
really the man he was impersonating; indeed that course would make but
another step in the continued deception of Roger Barnet, and Hal was
bound to take such steps--not avoid them--for the next five days.
"Mistress Hazlehurst," replied Hal, taking a kind of furtive joy in
using her name upon his lips for the first time, "I do not deny that I
am Sir Valentine Fleetwood; but I did not kill your brother. I wish you
heaven's blessing and a good night, for I am going on!" With that he
started his horse forward.
"Take him!" she shouted to her men. "Ye shall pay for it an he escape!"
The threat had effect. The attendants crowded upon Hal, some with swords
drawn, some with clubs upraised; so that his horse, after a few steps,
reared wildly upon its haunches, and sought a way out of the press.
"Back, dogs!" commanded Marryott, striking right and left with sword and
pistol. There were cries of pain from men and horses; the men wielded
their weapons as best they could; but a way was somehow opened. Mistress
Hazlehurst herself was forced against the fence at the roadside, one of
her followers--a slender, agile youth--skilfully interposing his horse
and body between her and the crush. She would have pressed into the
midst of the blows and of the rearing beasts, had not this servant
restrained her horse by means which she, in her excitement, did not
perceive. But she continued calling out orders, in a loud, wrathful
voice.
As Hal opened way, Anthony and Bottle followed close, preventing the
enemy from closing in upon his rear. The Puritan used a short sword with
a business-like deliberation and care, and with no word or other vocal
sign than a kind of solemnly approbative grunt as he thrust. Bottle, who
rode last, handled his long rapier with great swiftness and potency, in
all directions, swearing all the while; and finally let off his two
pistols, one after the other, at two men who hung with persistence upon
Hal's flanks, while Hal was forcing the last opposition in front. One of
these two fell wounded or dead, the other was thrown by his maddened
horse; and finally the three fugitives were free of the mass of men and
beasts that had barred the way. One of the horses was clattering down
the road ahead, without a rider. Hal informed himself by a single glance
that Anthony and Kit were free and able, and then, with an "On we go!"
he spurred after the riderless horse toward Stevenage.
"After him, you knaves!" screamed Mistress Hazlehurst, in a transport of
baffled rage; but her servants, some unhorsed, some with broken heads or
pierced bodies, one with a pistol wound in his side, and the rest
endeavoring to get the horses under control, were quite heedless of her
cries.
"A sad plight to leave a lady in!" said Hal, who had heard her futile
order. He and his two men were now riding at a gallop, to regain lost
advantage.
"A devil of a woman!" quoth Captain Bottle, in a tone of mere comment,
void of any feeling save, perhaps, a little admiration.
"Why did she not know me, either as Sir Valentine, or as not being Sir
Valentine?" asked Hal, calling ahead to Anthony, who had resumed his
place in front.
"She hath dwelt most time in London with a city kinswoman," was the
answer, "and Sir Valentine hath lived usually in France since she was
born."
"'Tis well Master Barnet knew Sir Valentine better, or knew him well
enough to take me for him in my disguise," said Hal.
"Trust Roger Barnet to know every papist in the kingdom," called out Kit
Bottle, "and to know every one else that's like to give occasion for his
services. It is a pride of his to know the English papists whereever
they be. Roger is often on the Continent, look you. He is the privy
council's longest finger!"
"Tell me of this Mistress Hazlehurst," said Hal to the Puritan, to whose
side he now rode up. "Is't true she is the sister of the gentleman Sir
Valentine fought?"
"His only sister," returned Anthony. "His only close kin. She is now
heiress to the Hazlehurst estate, and just old enough to be free of
wardship."
"A strong love she must have borne her brother, to fly straight from his
funeral to see him avenged!"
"Nay, I know not any great love betwixt 'em. They could not live in the
same house, or in the same county, for their wrangles--being both of an
ungodly violence. 'Twas her brother's unrighteous proneness to anger
that forced the brawl on Sir Valentine. 'Twas that heathenish
quarrelsomeness, some say, that kept Mr. Hazlehurst a bachelor. 'Tis a
wonder the evil spirit of wrath in him brought him not sooner to his
death. He fought many duels,--not hereabouts, where men were careful
against provoking him, but in France, where he lived much. 'Twas there,
indeed, that he and Sir Valentine best knew each other."
"And yet this sister must have loved him. Women are not commonly so
active toward punishing a brother's slayer," insisted Hal.
"Why," replied Anthony, "methinks this woman is a hothead that must
needs do with her own hands what, if she were another woman, she would
only wish done. 'Tis a pride of family that moveth her to look to the
avenging of her brother's death. A blow at him she conceiveth to be a
blow at herself, the two being of same name and blood. This sister and
brother have ever been more quick, one to resent an affront against the
other from a third person, than they have been slow to affront each
other. I am not wont to speak in the language of the lost, or to apply
the name of the arch-enemy to them that bear God's image; but, indeed,
as far as a headstrong will and violent ways are diabolical, yon profane
man spoke aptly when he named Mistress Anne a devil of a woman!"
"All's one for that," said Hal, curtly. "But, certes, as far as a
matchless face and a voice of music are angelical, I speak as aptly when
I name this Mistress Anne an angel of a woman! It went against me to
leave her in the road thus, in a huddle of bleeding servants and runaway
horses."
"Tis a huddle that will block the way for Roger Barnet a while," put in
Captain Bottle.
"Doubtless he and his men have ridden up to her by now," replied
Marryott. "I'd fain see what is occurring betwixt them." Then lapsing
into silence. Hal and his two attendants rode on, passing through
slumbering Stevenage, and continuing uninterruptedly northward.
Barnet's party had indeed come up to Mistress Hazlehurst's, and the
scene now occurring between them was one destined to have a strange
conclusion.
Anne's followers,--raw serving men without the skill or decision to have
used rightly their numerical superiority over the three fugitives,--all
were more or less hurt, except two,--the slight one who had personally
shielded her, and the lantern-bearer, who had been taken out of the
fray by the intractability of his horse. Not only was her escort useless
for any immediate pursuit of the supposed Sir Valentine, but the
condition of its members required of her, as their mistress and leader,
an instant looking to. The necessity of this forbade her own mad impulse
to ride unaided after the man who had escaped her, and whom she was the
more passionately enraged against because of his victory over her and of
his treatment of her servants. Nothing could have been more vexatious
than the situation into which she had been brought; and she was bitterly
chafing at her defeat, while forcing herself to consider steps for the
proper care of her injured servants, when Barnet's troop came clattering
up the road.
Mistress Hazlehurst's horses, except the runaway, had now been got under
command; some of her men, merely bruised in body or head, stood holding
them; others, worse hurt, lay groaning at the roadside, whither she had
ordered their comrades to drag them. Anne herself sat her horse in the
middle of the road, the little fellow, still mounted, at her left hand.
Such was the group that caused Barnet and his men to pull up their
horses to an abrupt halt. Peering forward, with eyes now habituated to
the darkness, the royal pursuivant swiftly inspected the figures before
him, perceived that Sir Valentine and his two attendants were not of
them, wondered what a woman was doing at the head of such a party,
dismissed that question as none of his business, and called out:
"Madam, a gentleman hath passed you, with two men. Did he keep the road
to Stevenage, or turn out yonder?"
"Sir Valentine Fleetwood, mean you?" asked Anne, with sudden eagerness.
"The same. Way to pass, please you. And answer."
Roger Barnet was a man of middle height; bodily, of a good thickness and
great solidity; a man with a bold, square face, a frown, cold eyes, a
short black beard; a keeper of his own counsel, a man of the fewest
possible words, and those gruffly spoken. Anne, because her mind was
working upon other matter, took no offence at his sharp, discourteous,
mandatory style of addressing her. Without heeding his demand for way,
she said:
"Sir Valentine hath indeed passed! See how he dealt with my servants
when I tried to stay him! Are you magistrate's men?"
"I am a messenger of the queen," said Barnet, deigning an answer
because, on looking more closely at her horses, a certain idea had come
to him.
"In pursuit of Sir Valentine?" she asked.
"With a warrant for his apprehension," was the reply.
"What! For my brother's death? Hath her Majesty heard--"
"For high treason; and if these be your horses, in the queen's name--"
But Mistress Hazlehurst cut short his speech, in turn.
"High treason!" she cried, with jubilation; and this thought flashed
through her mind: that if taken for high treason, her enemy, a Catholic
of long residence in France, was a doomed man; whereas a judicial
investigation of his quarrel with her brother might absolve Sir
Valentine from guilt or blame. True, the state's revenge for an offence
against itself would not, as such, be her revenge for an offence against
her family, and would not in itself afford her the triumph she craved;
but Sir Valentine was in a way to escape the State's revenge; she might
be an instrument to effect his capture; in being that, she would find
her own revenge. She could then truly say to her enemy, "But for me you
might be free; of my work, done in retaliation for killing my brother,
shall come your death; and so our blood, as much as the crown, is
avenged." All this, never expressed in detail, but conceived in entirety
during the time of a breath, was in her mind as she went on:
"God's light, he shall be caught, then! He went toward Stevenage. I will
ride with you!"
"Nay, madam, there are enough of us. But your horses are fresher than
ours. I take some of yours, in the queen's name, and leave mine in your
charge." And he forthwith dismounted, ordering his men to do likewise.
But ere he made another movement, his hand happening to seek his pouch,
he uttered an oath, and exclaimed:
"The queen's letters! There's delay! They must be delivered to-night.
Madam, know you where Sir William Crashaw's house is? And Mr. Richard
Brewby's?"
"Both are down the first road to the right."
"Then down the first road to the right I must go, and let Sir Valentine
Fleetwood gain time while I am about it. Which is your best horse,
mistress? And one of your men shall guide me to those gentlemen's
houses." And, resigning his horse to a follower, he strode into the
midst of the Hazlehurst group.
"But why lose this time, sir?" said Anne. "Let my man himself bear these
letters."
"When I am charged with letters," replied Roger Barnet, "they pass not
from me save into the hands for which they are intended. I shall carry
these letters, and catch this traitor. By your leave, I take this
horse--and this--and this. Get off, fellow! Hudsdon, bring my saddle,
and saddle me this beast. Change horses, the rest of you."
"But will you not send men after this traitor, while you bear the
letters?" queried Anne, making no protest against the pressing of her
horses into the queen's service,--a procedure in which no attempt was
made to include the horse she herself was on.
Barnet gave a grunt of laughter, to which he added the words, "My men go
with me!" Perhaps he dared not trust his men out of his sight, perhaps
he wished no one but himself to have the credit of taking the fugitive,
perhaps he needed the protection of his complete force against possible
attack.
"But, man," cried Anne, sharply, "you will lose track of Sir Valentine!
You will take two hours, carrying those letters!"
"Why, mistress," replied Barnet, as the change of horses from one party
to the other went rapidly on, "will not people in farmhouses and
villages hear his three horses pass?" Though he assumed a voice of
confidence, there was yet in it a tone betraying that he shared her
fears.
"He ought to be followed while he is yet scarce out of hearing," said
Anne, "and overtaken, and hindered one way or another till you catch
up."
Barnet cast a gloomy look at her, as if pained at the mention of a
course so excellent, but in the present case so impossible.
"My horse is the best in the county," she went on. "I can catch
him,--hang me if I cannot! I can delay him, too, if there be any way
under heaven to do so! Dickon, look to thy wounded fellows! See them
taken home, and show this gentleman the way to Sir William Crashaw's and
Mr. Brewby's. Come, Francis!"--this to the small attendant who kept
always near her--"God be praised, you are well-mounted, too!" And she
turned her horse's head toward Stevenage.
"But, Mistress Anne," cried Dickon, in dismay, "you will be
robbed--killed! Ride not without company!"
"Let go, Dickon, and do as I bid! I shall ride so fast, the fiend
himself cannot catch me, till I fall in with that traitor; and then I
shall have him and his men for company till this officer come up to him.
Master Messenger, for mine own reasons I promise to impede Sir
Valentine; to be a burden, a weight, and a chain upon him, holding him
back by all means I can devise, till you bear your letters and o'ertake
him. Dickon, heed my orders! Follow me. Francis! Ods-daggers, must I be
a milksop, and afraid o' nights, because I wasn't born to wear hose
instead of petticoats?" And having by this time got her horse clear of
the group in the road, she made off toward Stevenage, followed by her
mounted page. Francis.
"It may turn out well for us that Sir Valentine Fleetwood happened to
kill her brother," was the only comment of Roger Barnet, as he mounted
the horse his man Hudsdon had newly saddled. He had seen much and many,
in his time, and was not surprised at anything, especially if it bore
the shape of a woman.