The MS. in a Red Box Part 4

"Why should our estate bear all the cost of these proceedings? Surely every Commoner ought to pay his share."

"Thou art somewhat hasty, Frank," my father replied, "to call Temple Belwood _our_ estate. If I chose to spend in defence of the rights of the Islonians, my son has no authority to call me to account."

"Is it your pleasure," I asked, "that I should go to the plough-tail to-morrow?"

"Don't talk like a fool, boy."

"I became a man to-day, sir."

"Discretion limps behind old Father Time, it seems."

I suppressed the easy retort, and my father continued--

"If you have not your father's public mind, I am sorry; but your private interests are safe enough, and Temple Belwood will be yours without enc.u.mbrance on a single acre."

Again I was amazed and mute.

"Ryther is engaged to return the deeds to you on the day you wed his daughter."

Now I understood mysteries; Ryther's insolence at dinner, for one, and his daughter's manner, for another. My father had squandered money in a business which was no more his than that of any gentleman in the Isle, a.s.sured that all damage to the estate would be repaired by this absurd covenant of marriage. The Vavasour patrimony was lost, and all the ceremony and merrymaking of the day had been in honour of the heir of--Nothing.

The state of things was maddening and yet laughable, and laughter would have its way. I shook with it.

"What in the world is there to laugh at?" shouted my father.

"G.o.d knows, I don't," I answered, still laughing.

It was my father's turn to be astonished. He gazed doubtfully at me until my fit was over. Then he said--

"You have taken too much wine. We will speak of this business when sleep has sobered you." And he went off to bed.

I was coward enough to be glad of the respite, foreseeing that my father's grief and anger would be hard to bear, when he knew that I would wed no woman on earth but Anna Goel.

CHAPTER IV

I could not now set down all that pa.s.sed between my father and me on the marriage, which he designed for me; nor would I, if I could, for I said much that even to-day makes my ears burn to remember, and he some things which are better forgotten. I believe he was the hotter with me that he did not in his heart like the alliance which he proposed, and was obliged to do violence to his own feelings in urging it upon me.

We ended in anger, and were estranged the one from the other. For some time we did not feel the full painfulness of this, by reason of my father's occupation with the affairs of the Isle, which took him much abroad, and brought many visitors and messengers to Temple Belwood when he was at home.

While he was busied with these matters, I haunted the neighbourhood of Castle Mulgrave in hope of chance encounter with Mistress Goel. The distance between the two houses was not much more than three miles.

Sometimes I rowed my boat down the Nolffd.y.k.e, and so into Trent, when I hoisted sail, and beat up and down the river on the look-out for the earl's pleasure barge. At other times I rode by the causey which crossed the marsh extending from Beltoft to the b.u.t.terwick ferry, and scoured the roads and lanes on the other side of the river. My quest brought me but one glimpse of my lady. Once, as I gained a slight eminence on the eastern bank, I saw her with a party entering the courtyard of the castle--on horseback! She had learned to ride since I had last spoken with her, and I ground my teeth thinking of who had taught her, and of the mounting and dismounting, and all the occasions which the tutor had to touch hand and foot, even it might be to take her in his arms. How I hated Sheffield! And, for the time, I almost hated Mistress Goel, too.

The day after this maddening sight, d.i.c.k Portington came to Temple with news which at another time would have mightily stirred me. Hatfield Chace was to be disparked. The deer were to be driven and caught, to be taken away and distributed in other of the royal forests. When the Chace had been cleared, Vermuijden might fell timber, drain off the waters, and allot the land.

"No more winding of the horn, no more following of the deer, my boy,"

said d.i.c.k. "We ought to see the last stag hunt in Hatfield. And there may be other sport besides the driving of the deer. So come along."

"What manner of sport?" I asked.

"You know how many of our fellows in Thorne and Crowle reckon the Chace as much their domain as the King's. They are not over well-pleased to lose their venison, or their pastime. Moonlight nights will be dull when there's no more stalking of the King's game, or chance to warm one's blood in a fight with his keepers."

"You speak feelingly, d.i.c.k," said I, laughing.

"Ay, that do I," he answered. "But the fowlers and fishers take it worse than I do. A fat buck once in a while is worth much to a poor man. There will be sullen faces looking on to-day."

"But the foresters will be too strong for a.s.sault," I replied.

"May be so. But hark you, boy, Vermuijden and some of his people are to meet a party from old Mulligrubs' to-day at the Crown, the more fools they."

This news set my pulse going. What so likely as that Doctor Goel and his daughter would be present at a meeting between the earl (whom it was d.i.c.k's whim to misname Mulligrubs) and the Dutch leader? And if there should be trouble brewing, the more reason that a friend should be at hand. So I answered--

"Have with you, then!"

But there was not a horse in the stable at the time, except the old white mare. Luke had ridden Trueboy to Haxey, and the rest were galloping on my father's errands. When I said so to d.i.c.k, he answered--

"Why wait for a horse? Get stilts for us both, and we'll cross the marsh to Messic Mere, and take one of Holmes's boats. With this wind we can fly up Idle as fast we could ride round."

So we did. Walking to Belshaw, we mounted our stilts there, and were quickly across the fen. The long, dry weather had made it pa.s.sable for those who knew the shallows and the lie of the ridges, if they had skill with the stilts, and few Islonians had more than Portington and I. We took boat at Holmes's, and then sped up the river merrily, d.i.c.k with the sheet in his hand, I steering. It was right pleasant going, with the wind rustling and whistling among the reeds on either bank, the water hissing and rippling from the prow, as we wound along narrow lanes of water, and out into wide s.p.a.ces where the fowls, startled by our coming, made off, flapping and screaming, or scuttled in among the sedges and bulrushes. One never has the feeling of being away and apart from the rest of the world, I think, quite so much anywhere else as in lonely water-ways, and we two sat silently enjoying the quiet of the scene for a while. At length d.i.c.k spoke--

"D'ye know, Frank, that it is part of Vermuijden's scheme to stop the Idle?"

"I don't take," I answered.

"He plans to cut off the river at the Nottingham border--has begun cutting the drain which is to turn the water into Trent."

"Is he empowered to pull down churches that he may use the stones to embank his drains?" I asked; for to me it appeared sacrilege to dry up our rivers and streams.

"Doubtless he might do that, if he would pay money enough into the empty exchequer," replied d.i.c.k; "and for a trifle more he might have royal authority to dig up our ancestors' bones, and burn them for the lime he could get out of 'em."

Before we reached Tudworth, Squire Portington's place, a noise in the distance told us that the driving of the deer had begun; and, as soon as might be, we were in the saddle and on our way into the forest, guided by the sound of shouting men and barking dogs. For some time we rode on, neither meeting nor seeing any one. The course of the drivers seemed to be winding away from us. Suddenly, as we emerged from the shadow of a thickish grove, we saw in the open before us a doe and her fawn standing in a stream, drinking. Behind them were some of the finest oaks in the Chace, magnificent in the splendour of mid-June foliage. My friend drew rein, and cursed all Dutchmen with a vehemence that might have provoked laughter from a cooler companion.

"Think of it, Frank," he said. "Not a buck to be left! These trees to be cut down! No more music of hound and horn!"

How long d.i.c.k might have cursed and lamented, I know not, but for the coming of a verderer, who told us that the beaters had orders to drive toward Thorne Mere, and that we had best ride in that direction, if we desired to see the taking of the deer. So we hastened northward instead of following the army of keepers, and made for the rising ground above the mere, where we found a great crowd of gentle and simple already gathered.

In a short time an immense herd burst from the covert of the wood, followed by a mult.i.tude of men and dogs. Nearly all the deer took to the water, and then were pursued by a hundred or more boats. A few took refuge on islets here and there, and some swam right across the mere, but far the greatest number huddled together, terrified and exhausted, in water up to their necks. The fellows in the boats surrounded the little forest of horns, and some ventured amongst them, and tying a strong, long rope to their heads, dragged them to land, and bundled them into carts, or tethered them for ease of driving whither they were to be handed over to the keepers of other forests. To me it was a sorry sight, and one of which I soon tired. So, leaving d.i.c.k with some of his cronies, and a promise to meet at the Crown in a couple of hours' time, I made my way at once to the inn, in hope to glean some knowledge from the people there of the company expected.

Turning a sharp corner of the lane pretty quickly, I almost ran over a lady coming along the causey in the opposite direction. As I drew up, I perceived that it was Mistress Goel. There was a little difficulty in forcing my steed into the wide ditch; but that done, I dismounted, and made my salutation, saying something of my pleasure in meeting her.

"My pleasure was somewhat dashed by fear of being knocked down," said she. "Is it customary in this country for hors.e.m.e.n to keep the path, and drive foot pa.s.sengers into the ditch?"

"Your riding-master must have taught you so much," I answered.

"And how come you to know I have had lessons?"

"By seeing how well you ride."