The Black Tor Part 12

"Pray G.o.d the rope may not break."

Mark was conscious now of being sc.r.a.ped against the rock, and brushed by twigs, for what seemed to be a very long time, before he was roughly seized by more hands, and dragged heavily over the cliff edge, to be dropped upon the short gra.s.s, as a voice he had heard before cried harshly,--

"You've done it now, Master Ralph, and got your wolf cub after all."

"Yes," panted Ralph hoa.r.s.ely, as Mark felt as if a cloud had suddenly rolled away from his sight, and he saw clearly that half-a-dozen men were surrounding him, and Ralph Darley, his greatest enemy, was kneeling at his side, saying softly,--

"Yes, I've got the wolf cub after all;" and then the two lads' eyes met, and gazed deeply into each other's in a curious stare.

That stare had the same effect on both lads--that of making them feel uncomfortable.

Mark Eden, as he recovered from the shock of being so near a terrible ending to his young life, felt that, surrounded as he was by enemies, he ought to spring to his feet, draw his sword, and defend himself to the last; while Ralph Darley knew that, according to all old family traditions, he ought to order his men to seize a hand and foot each, give his young enemy two or three swings, and launch him headlong off the mighty cliff, and then stand and laugh at the capers he would cut in his fall.

For people had been very savage in their revenges out in that wild part of England, shut away from the civilisation of the time by moor and mountain. Ralph knew, too, that though they were better then than in the early days of the Wars of the Roses, they were still brutal enough, and that he would gain the applause and respect of his men by giving them the order. But Mark Eden had not drawn his sword to begin cutting and thrusting; and instead of leaving the lad to hang till he fell, he, Ralph Darley, had, in opposition to his father's men, risked his own life to save that of his enemy--going down over a hundred feet, swinging at the end of a couple of ropes badly tied together.

"Seems very stupid," the two lads thought.

"What does he mean by coming here, and getting into such a horrible position--an idiot!" said Ralph to himself.

"How dare he, an insolent Darley, come down by a rope and save my life!"

said Mark to himself.

Then there was an awkward pause, with the two lads scowling, and avoiding each other's gaze, and the men nudging one another, and winking knowingly. Nick Garth whispering behind his hand to Ram Jennings, that the young c.o.c.ks would set up their hackles directly, whip out their spurs, and there would be a fight; and, in expectation of this, the men, six in number, now spread themselves into an arc, whose chord was the edge of the cliff, thus enclosing the pair so as to check any design on the part of the enemy to make a rush and escape.

Mark, who did not feel so breathless and numb now, sat up on the gra.s.s, and resumed his old role of ignoring his enemies, putting his hands behind him, to feel for the ravens hung from his sword-belt, taking them out from their awkward position, to find that they were limp and literally crushed. The reason for this was that when Ralph, as he swung, seized him, he had to do this from behind, clasping him round the chest, just under the arms, and then, as the rope was hauled, flinging his legs about him to help to hold, with the consequence that they formed a sort of sandwich, he and Mark being the slices of bread, and the young ravens the meat.

"Hah!" said Mark softly, as if to himself; "you two will never dig out any young lambs' eyes. Feed the fishes instead;" and, rising to his feet, he untied his kerchief from about the dead birds' legs, and gave each a swing, sending it on its first and last flight, out from the cliff edge, away into the gulf.

"Now's your time, Master Ralph," whispered Nick, "Whip out your sword, and show him how you can fight."

Ralph turned upon the man with an angry glance, and Nick shrank back into his old position with a sheepish grin, which, in conjunction with his cross eyes, did not improve his personal appearance.

Without so much as glancing at his enemies, Mark now took off his cap and smiled, for the egg he had so carefully placed in the lining was intact.

"Well done!" he said aloud. "That's for Master Rayburn at the cottage.

Here, one of you fellows, take that to him, and say I sent it. I dare say he'll give you a coin for your trouble."

Ram Jennings made an awkward shoot forward, and seized the egg.

"Don't break it, clumsy," cried Mark; and then with a quick motion, he threw his cap on the gra.s.s, took a step or two back toward the edge of the cliff, and, quick as lightning, drew his sword.

"There," he cried, with a scornful look at Ralph; "seven of you to one.

Come on."

A low growl from the men greeted this display, but Ralph did not stir, and Mark stood for a moment or two _en garde_. Then with a bitter laugh he continued: "I suppose I must surrender. You don't draw. Take my sword. My arm's wrenched, and I can't use it."

As he spoke he threw his sword at Ralph's feet; his enemy picked it up by the slight blade, and the men closed in.

This movement sent a flash of anger from their young master's eyes.

"Back," he cried hoa.r.s.ely. Then taking a step or two toward Mark, and still holding the sword by the blade, he presented the hilt to his enemy. "Take your sword, sir," he said haughtily. "The Darleys are gentlemen, not cowards, to take advantage of one who is down. That is the nearest way back to Black Tor," he continued, pointing.

For a few moments Mark stood gazing at his enemy, with his face flushing to his temples; then turning haggard and pale, as a flood of mingled sensations rushed through him; shame, mortification, pride, anger against self, seemed to choke all utterance, and he could not even stir.

He felt that he wanted to be brave and manly, and apologise for his words--to thank the gallant lad before him for saving his life--to make him see that he was a gentleman--to strike him and make him fight--to do something brave--despicable--to do he did not know what--before he accepted this permission to go, but he could for the moment do nothing-- say nothing.

At last, with a hoa.r.s.e gasp, he literally s.n.a.t.c.hed at the sword, and glared at his enemy with a menacing look, as if he were about to thrust at him; and Ralph's hand darted to his own hilt, but with an angry gesture, he let it fall, and stood firm.

Then a cry, mingled of rage and shame, escaped from Mark; and he thrust his sword back into its sheath, and pushing Nick aside, as the man stood in his way, he hurried down the hill.

"Yah-h-ah!" growled Nick savagely, "you aren't going to let him off like that, master?"

Mark heard the words, and turned round.

"How dare you speak to me like that!" cried Ralph, glad of some one on whom to vent the anger he felt.

"Because Sir Morton, if he'd been here, would have had that young Eden tied neck and heels, and pitched into one of the cells. Because you're a coward, sir. There!"

"Ah-h-ah!" growled the other men in chorus, as they glared at the lad.

"Then take a coward's blow," cried Ralph; and he struck the man with all his might across the face, using the back of his hand.

There was another growl from the men, but no one spoke, and Mark Eden turned again, and strode down the hill, while the men untied and coiled up the ropes, and slowly followed their young master down the slope, and then up once more toward the Castle, Nick Garth shaking his head a good deal, and looking puzzled, and a great deal interested in the blood which he kept smudging off, first with one hand, and then with the other, from his face.

"Here," he cried at last, as Ralph disappeared through the gateway, "what's best to stop this here? I can't go with it all tied up."

"Bucket o' water from the well," said Ram Jennings, grinning. "Say, Nick, he aren't such a coward, arter all."

"No," growled Nick, after a double wipe; "and, for such a little 'un, he can hit hard."

CHAPTER NINE.

ANOTHER TURN OF FORTUNE'S WHEEL.

Master Rayburn received the raven's addled egg, and gave Ram Jennings a groat for his trouble, and for telling him all about how it was obtained, and what followed, keeping the man, and questioning him a good deal, as he smiled and frowned over the task he began at once, that of chipping a good-sized hole in one side of the egg, and extracting its contents in a little wooden bowl of clean water.

At last, after a great deal of sniffing and shuffling about, the man said, "Done with me, Master Rayburn?"

"Yes," said the old man sharply. "Unless you can tell me any more. But why?"

"Well, master, I'm pretty hard about the smell, and it falls to me to clean out the pigsties; and when they've been left a month or two in the summer, and got pretty ripe, they aren't so nice as bean-fields in bloom, or the young missus's roses in her bit o' garden; but pigsties aren't nothing to that there _egg_. It's enough to pyson a black dog."

"Be off with you, then," said the old man, with a dry chuckle; and as soon as he was alone, he threw the foul water away. "Yes," he muttered, "it does smell; but that's a splendid egg, and not stained a bit."

"Hah!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed a few minutes later. "I'd have given something to be there. Brave lads. True English, to the backbone; but with their young minds warped and spoiled by the traditions of this miserable feud.

Why, it must have been grand," mused the old man, shaking his grey locks. "How I should have liked to see and hear it all! What a fight to master the inborn hatred! On both sides the evil contending with the good; and, according to that man's telling, that boy Mark did not show up well. I don't know, though! He could not help it. He had to fight the black blood in his veins that has been handed down for generations.

So young Ralph saved his life, made him prisoner, and set him at liberty like a true honest gentleman; and the other had to battle with his dislike and bitterness at receiving a favour from his enemy's hands.