The House of Walderne Part 32

But in the most solemn appeal of all, suddenly a woman's voice broke the intensity of the silence in which the preacher's words were received:

"My son--my own son--my dear son."

The speaker had not been at the dinner, and had only just returned from the woods, wherein she often wandered. For this was Mabel, the chieftain's wife, or "Mad Mab," as they flippantly called her, and only on hearing from afar the unwonted sound of preaching in the camp had she been drawn in. The voice thrilled upon her memory as she drew nearer, and when she entered the circle--we may well say the charmed circle--she stood entranced, until at last conviction grew into certainty, and she woke the enchantment of the preacher's voice by her cry of maternal love.

She was not far beyond the prime of life. Her face had once been strikingly handsome; Martin inherited her bright colour and dark eyes; but time had set its mark upon her, and often had she felt weary of life.

But now, after one of her monotonous rambles, like unto one distraught in the woods, had come this glad surprise. A new life burst upon her--something to live for, and, rus.h.i.+ng forward, she threw her arms around the neck of her recovered boy.

"My mother," said he in an agitated voice. "Nay, she has been long dead."

But as he gazed, the same instinct awoke in him as in her, and he lost self control. The sermon ended abruptly, the preacher was conquered by the man. The hearers gathered in groups and discussed the event.

"This explains how he knew all about us!"

"It is Martin, little Martin, who should have been our chieftain."

"The last of the house of Michelham!"

"Turned into a preaching friar!"

Grimbeard mused in silence. At last he gave a whispered order.

"Treat them both well, to the best of our power. But they must not leave the camp."

"Mother," said Martin, "why that cruel message of thy death? Thou hadst not otherwise lost me so long."

"It was for thy good. I would save thee from the life of an outlaw or vagabond, and foresaw that unless I renounced thee utterly, thy love would mar thy fortunes, and bring thee back to my side."

"My poor forsaken mother!"

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Grimbeard now approached.

"Well, young runaway, thou hast come back in strange guise to thy natural home. Dost thou remember me?"

"Well, step father, many a sound switching hast thou given me, which doubtless I deserved."

"Or thou hadst not had them. Well said, boy, and now wilt thou take up thy abode again with us? We want a priest."

"I am no priest, only a preacher, and my mission is to the Andredsweald at large, and the scattered sheep of the Great Shepherd therein."

"Only thou knowest our whereabouts too well. We may not let thee go in and out without security, that our retreat be not made known."

"Father, I have eaten of your bread, and once more of my own free will accepted your hospitality. Even a heathen would respect your secret, still more a Christian brother. If I can persuade you to cease from your mode of life, which the Church decrees unlawful, well and good. But other weapons than those of the Gospel shall never be brought against you by me."

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They had a long conversation that afternoon, wherein Grimbeard maintained that the position of the "merrie men," who still kept up a struggle against the Government in the various great forests of the land, such as green Sherwood and the Andredsweald, were simply patriots maintaining a lawful struggle against foreign oppressors.

Martin, on the other hand, maintained that the question was settled by Divine providence, and that the governors of alien blood were now the kings and magistrates to whom, according to Saint Paul, obedience was due. If two centuries did not establish prescriptive right, how long a period would?

"No length of time," replied Grimbeard.

"Ah well, then, step father, suppose the poor Welsh, who once lived here, and whom my own remote forefathers destroyed or drove from these parts, were to send to say they would thank the descendants of the Saxons, Angles, and Jutes to go back to their ancient homes in Germany and Denmark, and leave the land to them according to the principle you have laid down. What should you then say?"

Grimbeard was fairly puzzled.

"Thou hast me on the hip, youngster."

After this conversation Martin was so fatigued by the day's walk and all the subsequent excitement, that his mother prepared for him a composing draught from the herbs of the wood, and made him drink it and go to bed; a sweet bed of fragrant leaves and coverlets of skins in one of the huts, where she lodged her dear boy, her recovered treasure--happy mother.

The following morning, overcome by the emotions of the preceding day, Martin slept long. He was dreaming of the battle of Senlac, where he was heading a charge, when he awoke to find that the sounds of real present strife had put Senlac into his head.

He sat upright, a confused dream of fighting and struggling still lingering in his distracted mind. No, it was no dream; he heard the actual cry of those who strove for mastery: the exulting yell:

"Englishmen, on! down, ye French tyrants!"

"Out! out! ye English thieves!"

"Saint Denys! on, on! Saint Michael, s.h.i.+eld us!"

Then came the sound of fiercer strife, the cry of deadlier anguish.

For there with arrow, spear, and knife, Men fought the desperate fight for life.

Martin slipped on his garb, and hurried to the scene. He looked, gained a sloping bank, and there--

That morning, a merry young knight and his train set out from Herstmonceux Castle to go "a hunting," and in the very exuberance of his spirits, like Douglas of old, he thought fit to hunt in the woods haunted by the "merrie men," as he in the Percy's country.

Such a merry young knight, such a roguish eye.

But he had not ridden far into the debatable land when the path lay between two sloping, almost precipitous banks, crowned with underwood. All at once a voice cried:

"Stand! Who are ye? Whence come ye? What do ye here in the woods which free Englishmen claim as their own?"

A s.h.a.ggy form, a bull-like individual, stood above them. The young knight gazed upon his interlocutor with a comic eye.

"Why, I am Ralph of Herstmonceux, an unworthy aspirant to the honours of chivalry, and conceive I have full right to hunt in the Andredsweald without asking leave of any king of the vagabonds and outlaws, such as I conceive thee to be."

"Cease thy foolery, thou Norman magpie.

"Throw down your arms, all of you. Our bows are bent; you are in our power. You are covered, one and all, by our aim."

"Bring on your merrie men."

Not one of the waylaid party had put arrow to bow. This may seem strange, but they had sense enough to know (as the reader may guess), that the first demonstration of hostility would bring a shower of arrows from an unseen foe upon them. That, in short, their lives were in the power of the "merrie men," whose arrowheads and caps they could alone see peering from behind the tree trunks, and over the bank, amidst the purple heather.