The Courtship of Morrice Buckler Part 5

He spoke with so droll a melancholy that I had some ado to refrain from laughing, in spite of my vexation.

"But," said I, "surely this is not all your equipage?"

"Nay," returned he proudly, "I have its saddle and bridle. But for the rest of my horses, I lost them all playing ba.s.set with Lord Culverton.

He took them away only yesterday morning, but left me the mare, saying that he had no cart for her conveyance."

"Well," said I, "I must e'en make shift with her. She may carry me one stage."

And I walked out of the stables and back into the hall. Elmscott bade his groom saddle the mare and followed me, but I was too angry to speak with him, and seated myself sullenly at a table. However, he fetched a pie from the pantry and a bottle of wine, and set them before me. I had eaten nothing since I had disembarked the night before, and knowing, besides, that I had a weary day in store, I fell to with a good appet.i.te. Elmscott opened the door. The sun had just risen, and a warm flood of light poured into the hall and brightened the dark panels of the walls. With that entered the sound of birds singing, the rustle of trees, and all the pleasant garden-smells of a fresh September morning. And at once a great hope sprang up in my heart that I might yet be in time to prove the minister of Julian's need. I heard the sound of hoofs on the road outside.

"Lend me a whip!" I cried.

"You are still set on going?"

"Lend me a whip!"

He offered me an oak cudgel.

"Ph[oe]be has pa.s.sed her climacteric, and her perceptions are dull,"

he said; and then with a sudden change of manner he laid his hand on my shoulder. "'Twere best not to go," he declared earnestly. "Those who bring luck to others seldom find great store of it themselves."

But in the sweet clearness of the morning such thoughts seemed to me no more than night vapours, and I sprang down the steps with a laugh.

The mare shivered as I mounted, and swung her head around as though she would ask me what in the devil's name I was doing on her back. But I thwacked her flanks with the cudgel, and she ambled heavily through the square. I turned to look behind me. Elmscott was still standing on the steps.

"Morrice," he called out, "be kind to her! She is an heirloom."

CHAPTER III.

TELLS HOW I REACH BRISTOL, AND IN WHAT STRANGE GUISE I GO TO MEET MY FRIEND.

At length, then, I was fairly started on my way to Bristol. For my direction over this first stage of my journey I had made inquiries of Elmscott, and I rode westwards towards the village of Knightsbridge, thanking Providence most heartily for that the city still slept. For what with my disordered dress, my oak cudgel, and the weedy screw which I bestrode--I scruple to dignify her with the name of mare, for I have owned mares since which I loved, and would not willingly affront them--I could not hope to pa.s.s unnoticed were any one abroad, and, indeed, should esteem myself well-used to be counted no worse than a mountebank. Thus I crossed Hounslow Heath and reached Brentford without misadventure. There I joyfully parted with my Rosinante, and hiring a horse, rode post. The way, however, was ill-suited for speedy travelling, and my hope of seeing Julian that night dwindled with my shadow as the sun rose higher and higher behind my shoulders. Ruts deep and broad as new furrows trenched the road, and here and there some slough would make a wide miry gap, wherein my horse sank over the fetlocks. Some blame, moreover, must attach to me, for I chose a false turn at the hamlet of Colnbrook, and journeyed ten miles clean from my path to Datchet; so that in the end night found me blundering on the edge of Wickham Heath, some sixty-one miles from London. I had changed horses at Newbury, and I determined to press on at least so far as Hungerford. But I had not counted with myself. I was indeed overwrought with want of sleep, and the last few stages I had ridden with dulled senses in a lethargy of fatigue. At what point exactly I wandered from the road I could not tell. But the darkness had closed in before I began to notice a welcome ease and restfulness in the motion of the gallop. I was wondering idly at the change, when of a sudden my horse pops his foot into a hole. The reins were hanging loose on his neck; I myself was rocking in the saddle, so that I shot clean over his shoulder, turned a somersault in mid-air, and came down flat on my back in the centre of the Heath. For a while I lay there without an effort or desire to move. I felt as if Mother Earth had taken pity on my weariness, and had thus unceremoniously put me to bed. The trample of hoofs, however, somewhat too close to my legs, roused me to wakefulness, and I started up and prepared to remount. To my dismay I found that my horse was badly lamed; he could barely set his foreleg to the ground. The accident was the climax of my misfortunes. I looked eagerly about me. The night was moonless, but very clear and soft with the light of the stars. I could see the common stretching away on every side empty and desolate; here a cl.u.s.ter of trees, there a patch of bushes, but never a house, never the kindly twinkle of a lamp, never a sign of a living thing. What it behoved me to do, I could not come at, think as hard as I might. But whatever that might have been, what I did, alas! was far different.

For I plumped myself down on the gra.s.s and cried like a child. It seemed to me that G.o.d's hand was indeed turned against my friend and his deliverance.

But somehow into the midst of my lament there slipped a remembrance of Jack Larke. On the instant his face took shape and life before me, shining out as it were from a frame of darkness. I saw an honest scorn kindle in his eyes, and his lips shot "woman" at me. The visionary picture of him braced me like the cut of a whip. At all events, I thought, I would make a pretence of manhood, and I ceased from my blubbering, and laying hold of the horse by the bridle, led him forward over the Heath.

I kept a sharp watch about me as I walked, but it must have been a full two hours afterwards when I caught a glimpse of a light far away on my left hand, glimmering in a little thicket upon a swell of the turf. At first I was minded to reckon it a star, for the Heath at that point was ridged up against the sky. But it shone with a beam too warm and homely to match the silver radiance of the planets. I turned joyfully in its direction, and quickening my pace, came at length to the back of a house. The light shone from a window on the ground floor facing me. I looked into it over a little paling, and saw that it was furnished as a kitchen. Plates and pewter-pots gleamed orderly upon the shelves, and a row of n.o.ble hams hung from the rafters.

I hurried round the side of the house and found myself, to my great satisfaction, on a bank which overlooked the road. I scrambled down the side of it and knocked loudly at the door. It was opened by an elderly man, who stared at me in some surprise.

"You travel late, young sir," said he, holding the door ajar.

"I have need to," I replied. "I should have been in Bristol long ere this."

"'Tis strange," he went on, eyeing me a thought suspiciously. "I caught no sound of your horse's hoofs upon the road."

"'Twould have been stranger if you had," said I. "For I missed my way soon after sundown, and have been wandering since on the Heath. I saw the light of your house some half an hour agone over yonder," and I pointed in the direction whence I had come.

"Then you are main lucky, sir," he returned, but in a more civil tone.

"This is the 'Half-way House,' and it has no neighbours. In another hour we should have gone to bed--for we have no guests to-night--and you might have wandered until dawn."

With that he set the door back against the wall, and stood aside for me to pa.s.s.

"You must pardon my surliness," he said. "But few honest travellers cross Wickham Heath by dark, and at first I mistook you. I have never held truck with the gentry of the road, though, indeed, my pockets suffer for the ease of my conscience. However, if you will step within, my wife will get you supper while I lead your horse to the stables."

"The beast is lame," said I, "and I would fain continue my way to-night. Have you a horse for hire?"

"Nay, sir," said he, shaking his head. "I have but one horse here besides your own, and that is not mine."

"I need it only for a day," I urged eagerly; "for less than a day. I could reach Bristol in the morning, and would send it you back forthwith."

I plunged my hand into my fob, and pulled out a handful of money as I spoke.

"It is no use," he declared. "The horse is not mine. 'Twas left here for a purpose, and I may not part with it."

"It would be with you again to-morrow," I repeated.

"It may be needed in the meanwhile," said he. "It may be needed in an hour. I know not."

I let the coins run from my right hand into the palm of my left, so that they fell clinking one on the top of the other. For a second he stood undecided; then he spoke in a low voice like a man arguing with himself.

"I will not do it. The horse was left with me in trust--in trust.

Moreover, I was well paid for the trust." And he turned to me.

"Put up your money, sir," said he stubbornly. "You should think shame to tempt poor folk. You will get no horse 'twixt here and Hungerford."

I slipped the money back into my pocket while he moved away with the horse. It limped worse than ever, and he stopped and picked up its foreleg.

"It is no more than a strain, I think," he called out. "The wife shall make a poultice for it to-night, and you can start betimes in the morning."

It was a poor consolation, but the only one. So I made the best of it, and, taking my supper in the kitchen, went forthwith to bed. I was indeed so spent and tired that I fell asleep in the corner by the fire while my ham was being fried, and after it, was almost carried upstairs in the arms of my landlord. I had not lain in a bed since I left Leyden, and few sights, I think, have ever affected me with so pleasant a sense of rest and comfort as that of the little inn-chamber, with its white dimity curtains and lavender-scented sheets. I have, in truth, always loved the scent of lavender since.

The next morning I was early afoot, and, despatching a hasty breakfast, made my way to the stables. The innkeeper had preceded me in order to have all ready for my start; but he stood in the yard with the horse unsaddled.

"'Tis no use, sir," he said. "You must e'en walk to Hungerford."

I had but to see the horse take one step to realise the truth of his words, for it limped yet worse than the evening before. The foot, moreover, was exceeding hot and inflamed.

"Take it back," said I. "The poor beast must bide here till I return."

I followed him into the stable, and inquired of the road.

"You go straight," he said, "till you come to Barton Court, opposite the village of Kintbury--" when of a sudden I stopped him. There were but two stalls in the building, and I had just caught a glimpse of the horse which was tied up in the second. It was of a light chestnut in colour, with white stockings, and a fleck of white in its coat at the joint of the hip. The patch was like a star in shape, and very unusual.

"Why, this is Sir Julian Harnwood's horse," I cried, leaping towards it--"his favourite horse!"