The White Gauntlet Part 65

In the short period of ten minutes a change had pa.s.sed over Betsey's proud spirit--transforming her from a self-sacrificing friend, to an enemy equally devoting herself to Holtspur's destruction.

In her outraged bosom a revulsion had arisen that stirred her soul to its profoundest depths, and filled her heart with eager longings of revenge. She had seen the man she madly loved--for whom she had risked, if not life, at least liberty and reputation--in the arms of another; a bright and beautiful rival; his own arms fondly entwining that other's form; his lips fervently pressing hers. No wonder the heart of the pa.s.sionate peasant, distraught by such a spectacle, had yielded to the promptings of revenge!

"Come on!" she cried, gesticulating to the cuira.s.siers to follow her, "on to the Hedgerley road!"

"Our horses?" suggested the guard corporal.

"No, no!" responded the girl. "By the time you could get them, he will have gone where I don't know to find him. Come as you are; and I'll answer for overtaking them now. _They_ won't have any horses till they get beyond Wapsey's Wood. Come then, if you want to retake your prisoner."

The others were disposed to set forth at once, and afoot. Withers, although for special reasons the most eager of any, appeared to hesitate.

"Your sure you don't want to mislead us, Betsey? You've fooled me once this night; and hang me if I let _you_ go, till I've laid hands on him!"

"Nonsense!" exclaimed the girl, "havn't I told you why I helped to let him out? The lady that sent _me_, would have given her eyes to see him; but since he's taken to the other, I know she'll be only too glad to hear that he's brought back to his prison. Much as she'd a thanked me for getting him out, when I tell her, what I've seen, she'll give double to have him retook. Don't be silly then. You'll suffer if he escapes.

Come on with me, and I'll promise he shan't."

The prospect of his prisoner getting clear off and its consequences to himself, thus forcibly brought before the mind of the negligent sentinel, at once put a period to his indecision; and without further opposition he threw himself along with the others; who, yielding to the guidance of the girl, hurried off upon the pursuit.

Instead of going to the point of rendezvous, which she had given to Holtspur himself, Bet conducted the cuira.s.siers out of the park by a path altogether different. She knew that the fugitive must by that time have found those to whom she had directed him. He would be no longer within the limits of the park; but on his way up the back road to Beaconsfield. To intercept him was her design; and this might still be done, by hastening along a bye-path well-known to her, which by a shorter route debouched upon the road he should have to take. By this path, therefore, did she conduct his pursuers.

On reaching the road the party moved more slowly. The rain had ceased falling, and the moon had suddenly made its appearance in a cloudless sky. The corporal of the guard, who chanced to be an experienced scout, here commanded a halt.

"We needn't go any further this way," said he, glancing towards the ground. "No one has pa.s.sed up this road before us. You see, my pretty guide, there's not a track?"

"Then we must be ahead o' them," replied the individual thus addressed.

"I know they were to come this way--I am sure of it."

"In that case we had best wait here," muttered the corporal to his men.

"It's a capital spot for an ambuscade. These bushes will conceal us from the eyes of any one coming along the road. Hus.h.!.+ surely I heard a voice?"

The guard, hitherto addressing each other only in whispers, obeyed the command of the corporal; and stood silently listening.

Sure enough there was a voice--a human voice. It sounded like the moaning of some one who lay upon a bed of sickness! It was low, and apparently distant.

"It's like as if some poor devil was giving his last kick?" muttered one of the cuira.s.siers.

"It's only the owls hooting among the trees," suggested another.

"Hus.h.!.+" again exclaimed the corporal. "There are other voices--nearer.

Hus.h.!.+"

"Good!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, after listening a while. "There are men coming along the road behind us! It must be _them_! Here! three of you on this side; the others across the road. Lie quiet till they come close up. When I give the word, spring out upon them. Quick, comrades! Not a movement till you hear my signal!"

Promptly obedient to these instructions, the soldiers drew themselves into the thicket--some dropping upon their knees among the bushes-- others standing erect, but screening their bodies behind the trunks of the beeches.

The corporal disposed of himself in a similar fas.h.i.+on; while the guide, having glided off to a greater distance, stood trembling among the trees--like some guilty denouncer--dreading to look upon the spectacle of that capture she had conducted to the probability of a too certain success.

Volume Three, Chapter VI.

On arriving at the rear of the garden, Holtspur had emerged out of the moat, and struck across the open pasture in a direct line for the timber. The darkness was still sufficiently obscure to hinder his being seen--at least, from any great distance; though there were those standing within the shadow of the trees who had marked his approach.

A low whistle--peculiarly intoned--told him that he was observed, and by friends: for in that whistle he recognised an old hunting signal of his ancient henchman--Gregory Garth.

There was no need to make reply. In an instant after, Garth was by his side--accompanied by the deer-stealer.

The plan of further proceedings took not much time to concert.

The programme had been already traced out, subject to such contingencies as might unexpectedly arise.

Dancey was to hurry back to his cottage, where Oriole had been left in charge of Garth's horse--that steed of the royal stables--which, along with Dancey's nag, was the only mount that could be provided for the occasion. But as Dancey himself was to stay behind--there being no call for his expatriation just at that crisis--and as the Indian could track it afoot almost as fast as on horseback, the two horses had been deemed sufficient for the necessity.

The woodman's dwelling lay near the Oxford highway; and as it would waste some time to bring the horses across to the back road, running past Hedgerley, it had been decided that they should be taken along a private path through Wapsey's Wood, by Dancey and the Indian--there to be met by Holtspur and Garth going afoot along the parallel, but less frequented, road.

This arrangement, cunningly schemed by Garth, had in view the possibility of a pursuit, with the probability, in such case, that the pursuers would naturally keep along the high road.

The rendezvous having been arranged, the deer-stalker took his way back towards his own domicile; while Garth, conducting Holtspur, through the tract of timber, with which he had already made himself acquainted, climbed out over the palings of the park; and turned along the bridle road running towards Hedgerley.

Half a mile brought them to a point where Wapsey's Wood skirted the road--separated from it by a rude fence.

Garth was going in the advance, and for a time keeping silence--as if busied with some abstruse calculation.

"There be a tidyish bit o' night left yet," he at length remarked, glancing up to the sky, "I shed think I've time enough for that business."

The remark was made to himself, rather than to his companion, and as if to satisfy his mind, about some doubt he had been indulging in.

"Time enough for what?" asked Holtspur, who had overheard the muttered observation.

"Oh! nothin' muchish, Master Henry--only a little bit o' business I've got to attend to over in the wood there. 'Twon't take ten minutes; and, as time's preecious, I can tell ye about it when I gets back. Ah!

theear's the gap I war lookin' for. If ye'll just keep on at yer leisure, I'll overtake you afore you can get to t'other side o' the wood. If I doan't, pleeze wait a bit. I'll be up in three kicks o' an old cow."

Saying this, the ex-footpad glided through the gap; and, striking off among the trees, soon disappeared behind their close standing trunks.

Holtspur, slackening his pace, moved on along the road--not without wondering what could be the motive that had carried his eccentric conductor so suddenly away from him.

Soon, however, his thoughts reverted to her from whom he had so late separated; and, as he walked under the silent shadows of the trees, his spirit gave way to indulgence in a retrospect of that sweet scene, with which his memory was still warmly glowing.

From the rain that had fallen, the flowers, copiously bedewed, were giving out their incense on the soft air of the autumn night. The moon had suddenly made her appearance, amid banks of fleecy clouds, that were fantastically flitting across the face of the azure heaven.

Under her cheering light Holtspur sauntered leisurely along, reviewing over and over again the immediate and pleasant past; which, notwithstanding the clouds that lowered over his future, had the effect of tingeing it with a roseate effulgence.

There were perils before, as well as behind him. His liberty, as his life, was still in danger. He knew all this; but in the revel of that fond retrospect--with the soft voice of Marion Wade yet ringing in his ears--her kisses still clinging to his lips--how could he be otherwise than oblivious of danger?

Alas! for his safely he was so--recklessly oblivious of it--forgetful of all but the interview just ended, and which seemed rather a delicious dream than an experience of sober real life.

Thus sweetly absorbed, he had advanced along the road to the distance of some two or three hundred yards, from the place where Garth had left him. He was still continuing to advance, when a sound, heard far off in the wood, interrupted his reflections--at the same time causing him to stop and listen.

It was a human voice; and resembled the moaning of a man in pain; but at intervals it was raised to a higher pitch, as though uttered in angry e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n!

At that hour of the night, and in such a lonely neighbourhood--for Holtspur knew it was a thinly-peopled district--these sounds seemed all the stranger; and, as they appeared to proceed from the exact direction in which Garth had gone, Holtspur could not do otherwise than connect them with his companion.