THE HORSEMEN DEPART.
"Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold."--_As You Like It._
When Marryott looked down from the oriel, he saw the horses huddled in a
corner of the quadrangle. Rumney standing by the fountain, and several
men about to swing the long piece of timber against the door a second
time. Afar, at the gate by the road, as Hal could descry through the
leafless trees, a mounted man kept watch. Master Rumney preferred to
avoid witnesses, in his violation of the peace this Sunday morning.
Marryott flung open the casement, and leaned out, a pistol in each hand.
"Back!" he cried to the men with the branch. "Back, or two of you shall
die!"
The men stopped short, looked up at him, and stood hesitating.
"Batter down the door!" shouted Rumney to the men. "I'll look to this
cock!"
And he raised a pistol and fired at Hal. The ball sang past him and
found lodgment in the wall of the gallery. The men sprang forward with
the tree-branch. True to his threat, Hal let off both his pistols. Two
men fell,--one struck in the shoulder, the other in the thigh. One
howled, the other stared up at Hal in a kind of silent amazement.
With a wrathful curse, Rumney fired a second pistol at Marryott. But
Hal, having now to reload his weapons, had disappeared in good time.
Moreover. Rumney's aim was bad, for the fact that his better arm,
wounded the previous day, was now bound up and useless. Handing his
pistols to two men, for reloading, and grasping from one of these men a
weapon already loaded, the robber fiercely ordered his rascals to resume
the assault upon the door. They obeyed. The door quivered at their blow;
but its bars and braces held. As the men were rushing forward for a
third stroke with their improvised ram, flame and smoke suddenly belched
forth from the windows nearest the door, and two more fellows sank to
the snow. Kit Bottle and one of Hal's wounded followers had fired
through holes they had made in the glass.
Rumney's men rushed panic-stricken from the quadrangle, seeking
protection beyond the angle of the kitchen wing. Their leader followed
them. The men with the horses led off the frightened animals to the same
place. The court was now clear. Marryott returned to the hall.
"At this rate, we shall soon see Captain Rumney's heels, or his corpse,"
said Hal, to Kit Bottle.
"I know not," was the reply. "We have but taught him the folly of haste
and open attack. He will try craft next. Now is the time to watch every
hole by which even a mouse might crawl into this house. 'Tis well that
stout fellow, Hatch, has guard of the stable door. I would the Puritan
were back! I'm some troubled for the safety of his saintly skin. He is a
likable dog, for all his sour virtuousness. God-'a'-mercy, how his
conscience will bite at this breakage of the Sabbath!"
Marryott went up to the room where Tom and Francis were. The sound of
firing had aroused them, and they were in great curiosity. Mistress
Hazlehurst, Francis said, still slept. Marryott gave the two lads a
brief account of matters, for the information of the lady if she awoke.
He then rejoined Kit in the hall.
The morning wore on. Silence continued, without and within the house. No
further sign came of Rumney's presence in the vicinity. Marryott began
to discuss with Bottle the probabilities of the robbers having fled,
appalled at the utterly bootless loss of four men. "Rumney is a
deviceful rascal," was the burden of Kit's replies.
Hal made the rounds of the house. Neither Moreton nor Hatch, nor Oliver
at his upper window, had sound or sight of the enemy to report. No one
was to be seen from the windows. The mounted watchman at the gate had
disappeared. But, as Bottle said, when Marryott returned again to the
hall, these facts did not answer the question of Rumney's proximity.
There were outbuildings, detached from the house; in these the rascals
might have taken refuge while biding the formation of a plan. The
watchman might have concealed himself behind the gatehouse.
While Hal and his lieutenant were sitting in talk, near the fire, there
arose a sound of hasty steps in an upper corridor, and Oliver Bunch
appeared at the stair-head.
"Master Underhill is coming!" he announced, in a loud, excited whisper.
"Follow us!" replied Hal, starting off with Kit at once. The three
traversed some rooms, a passage, and part of the kitchen wing, and
arrived in the half dark stables.
"Open the small door!" called Marryott, in a low tone, to John Hatch.
"And stand all, with sword and pistol, to bar the way 'gainst any but
Underhill!"
Hatch undid the door, and flung it wide; then drew his weapons, and
stood beside Marryott and Kit, just within the entrance. Behind these
three crouched Oliver Bunch, trembling, but with sword and pistol in
hand.
Through the blown flakes in the park, Anthony could be seen riding madly
for the door. His cloak stood out behind him. From his left shoulder
swung a bag, which evidently contained the acquisitions of his journey
to the inn. In his right hand he held his naked sword. The manner of his
riding, the direction of his look, showed that he saw possible enemies
who might attempt to cut him off.
Marryott took a step forth from the stable, and followed Anthony's look.
It was directed toward a long shed, whose open side, being from the
house, was invisible to Hal, but visible to the Puritan. As the young
gentleman fixed his glance on that shed, there ran out from it nine or
ten men, afoot, whose manifest purpose was indeed to intercept Anthony.
Hal recognized them as of Rumney's band, but their leader was not with
them. Anthony spurred his horse for a final dash.
The foremost robber fired a pistol. Anthony's horse swayed, toppled
over, lay quivering on its side. The Puritan fell free of the animal,
having swung his leg over its back in the nick of time. Ere he could
rise, his enemies were close upon him.
Marryott and Kit fired their pistols into the pack; then dropped these
smoking weapons inside the stable door, and rushed out with ready
swords to save the Puritan. Two robbers had sunk down as if tripped up
by a rope, and two behind these fell over them in the onward rush. The
fellows menacing Anthony, warned of the coming of Hal and Kit by the
latter's loud-bellowed curses, turned so as not to be taken in the rear
by them. This gave the Puritan time to rise to his feet. While his two
rescuers engaged the nearest knaves. Anthony, to save the provisions,
skirted the crowd and made for the door. But he was headed off by other
rascals. John Hatch now ran forward to his aid, leaving Oliver Bunch
alone to hold the doorway.
Two robbers, seeing this opportunity of gaining an entrance, charged the
door. The trembling Bunch emptied his pistol into the breast of one, and
made a feeble sword-thrust at the other. But the sword was dashed from
his shaking hand. Oliver saw his antagonist's blade flash toward him,
and dropped to the ground, uncertain whether he was killed or not. The
robber, not to lose time, and joined by one of the knaves that had
previously fallen unhurt, sprang over the servant's body, and ran
through the stables, toward the door to the kitchen wing.
Kit Bottle killed his man in time to meet the attack of the second
fellow that had fallen unhurt. Marryott was still engaging his first
opponent, a black-bearded rascal of great strength and agility. Hal had
at last detected the weak place in the other's guard, and was about to
profit by it, when suddenly a fearful shriek, far-off but piercing, made
his heart jump. It was borne from a window of the further wing of the
mansion; was, as he recognized with a chill of the senses, from Mistress
Hazlehurst.
He instantly leaped back from his antagonist, turned, and ran for the
open door. Half way through the stables, he came upon one of the two
robbers that had gained entrance. The fellow wheeled about, at sound of
footsteps behind. With a single thrust, Hal cleared the way of him, and
bounded on. At the door to the kitchen wing, the other robber was
encountered in similar manner, and was as speedily removed. Gaining the
main part of the mansion, Hal heard additional screams and cries for
help, which now reached his ears by indoor ways. Like a madman, he
dashed through the intervening rooms, cleared the hall, rushed up the
stairs, traversed the corridor, sprang across the outer room, which was
empty, and entered her chamber.
In the centre of the apartment lay one of Rumney's men, apparently done
for. Near him were Francis, with a bleeding gash across his forehead,
and Tom Cobble, his jerkin reddened by a fresh wound in the body. At the
open window, a man was holding ready the top of a ladder, whose foot
must have rested on the ground outside; while another man was tying the
wrists of Mistress Hazlehurst, who was standing in a half fainting
position in the single available arm of Rumney.
[Illustration: "RUMNEY ... BACKED QUICKLY TO THE WINDOW, AND MOUNTED
THE LEDGE."]
The visible top of the ladder explained all. With a small force, leaving
his other men at the shed. Rumney had caused this ladder--found in one
of the outbuildings--to be stealthily placed at the chamber window, and
had made good his ascent so quietly that even Tom and Francis, in the
outer room, knew not of his presence until apprised by the shriek that
had summoned Marryott.
Whether Rumney had known that this was Anne's chamber might be inquired
into later. The present business was to rescue her from his grasp, and
Hal rushed blindly forward to the work, his sword still dripping with
the blood it had taken in the stables.
A smile of joy on Anne's face, driving the terror from her eyes,
welcomed him to the task. But ere he could thrust at her captor, the
latter had swiftly turned, so as to be shielded by her body. Rumney
then, bearing her in one arm, as if she were of small weight, backed
quickly to the window, and mounted the ledge. Hal rushed after.
The man who had been tying her wrists dropped to his knees, caught Hal's
legs in both arms, and brought him heavily to the floor; then clambered
over him on all fours, and grasped his sword-wrist with a powerful hand.
Hal cast a glance of dismay at Anne, who looked down at him with
astonished and terrified eyes. Rumney, shouting two words as to some one
holding the bottom of the ladder, bestrode the window, and set foot on
one of the rounds. Doubtless, having no able arm free to grasp the
ladder with, he was to be supported by the man who should follow him
down.
"God's light, she is lost!" cried Hal, in tones of despair.
Just then there came, from the direction of the road, a peculiar sound,
half cry, half whistle. It gave Captain Rumney a start; made him turn
pale and stand still, with one foot on the ladder. It caused the man at
the ladder's top to look anxiously at Rumney, and the robber upon Hal to
rise and stride toward the window. By the time Hal was on his feet, the
call was repeated a little nearer. Rumney hesitated no longer. With a
muffled oath, he released Mistress Hazlehurst, and slid, rather than
stepped, down the ladder. Hal's man seized Anne, dragged her back from
the window ledge to clear the way for himself, and thereby--probably
without intention--saved her from losing her balance and falling out of
the window. This rascal was speedily followed down the ladder by the one
who had held its top; and the chamber was thus suddenly freed of
robbers, excepting the inert one on the floor.
Marryott's first act was to cut the bonds from Anne's wrists. Motioning
away his proffered further assistance, she regained the bed, and lay
down exhausted, breathing rapidly from the excitement of the recent
peril. Hal thereupon looked out of the window, and saw Rumney and three
men running toward the rear of the wing, behind which they soon
disappeared. What meant this sudden flight?
Marryott would have questioned Anne, but she received his first
inquiries with shakes of the head, and with an expressed desire to be
left alone. He then examined the wounds of Francis and Tom, which were
painful, but apparently not serious. He assisted these two to the outer
room, and dragged out the body of the robber, who, it proved, had fallen
victim to the long knife of Tom Cobble. He now groaned, and opened his
eyes. Finding that he possessed his senses, and promising to send water
to him, Hal interrogated him as to why Rumney had selected that
particular window for his stolen entrance. The knave replied, weakly,
that when the robbers first rode around the house, they saw the lady
standing at that window.
This, if true, was news to both Francis and Tom; but they had been
asleep until roused by the shooting below. It was also a circumstance
hard to reconcile with Anne's manifest illness, and it made Hal
thoughtful.
Returning to the lower part of the house, whither more than one
consideration called him, Hal was surprised to encounter Kit Bottle in
the hall. The captain's face was wet with perspiration and blood.
"What?" cried Hal. "Is all well at the stable door?"
"Ay, the rascals heard their cry of danger, and took to their heels for
the shed where their horses were. Rumney and some others joined them
from behind the house, and forthwith it was switch and spur with all
that were left of them. They're off now, like the wind."
"And Anthony?"
"He and our men are safe inside; they're barricading the stable door.
There be some few scratches and knocks among us; nothing more."
"What made the rascals fly so suddenly? A cry of danger, say you? What
danger?"
"A cry of danger raised by their watchman in the road. He joined them as
they fled. Let us go up and look."
The two ascended to the oriel whence Hal had fired down on Rumney's
first assault. Kit's gaze instantly sought the road. At the distant gate
stood a large group of horsemen, who appeared to have just come up, and
to be scanning with interest the front of Foxby Hall. Several of them
wore cuirasses and steel head-pieces. In a moment, one of these turned
his horse toward the mansion; the others followed.
"Tis plain now," said Kit. "Rumney's watchman liked not the looks of
this party; perhaps he recognized that fellow at their head, and took
him to be after the Rumney gang."
"And who is the fellow at their head?" asked Hal, with a strange
thrill,--for he divined already the answer.
"'Tis Roger Barnet," said Kit, gruffly.