Beverly of Graustark Part 8

"And he is being kept from the hospital because I am a lazy, good-for-nothing little--Come on, Aunt f.a.n.n.y; we haven't a minute to spare. If he looks very ill, we do without breakfast."

But Baldos was the most cheerful man in the party. He was sitting with his back against a tree, his right arm in a sling of woven reeds, his black patch set upon the proper eye.

"You will pardon me for not rising," he said cheerily, "but, your highness, I am much too awkward this morning to act as befitting a courtier in the presence of his sovereign. You have slept well?"

"Too well, I fear. So well, in fact, that you have suffered for it. Can't we start at once?" She was debating within herself whether it would be quite good form to shake hands with the reclining hero. In the glare of the broad daylight he and his followers looked more ragged and famished than before, but they also appeared more picturesquely romantic.

"When you have eaten of our humble fare, your highness,--the last meal at the Hawk and Raven."

"But I'm not a bit hungry."

"It is very considerate of you, but equally unreasonable. You must eat before we start."

"I can't bear the thought of your suffering when we should be hurrying to a hospital and competent surgeons." He laughed gaily. "Oh, you needn't laugh. I know it hurts. You say we cannot reach Ganlook before to-morrow? Well, we can't stop here a minute longer than we--Oh, thank you!" A ragged servitor had placed a rude bowl of meat and some fruit before her.

"Sit down here, your highness, and prepare yourself for a long fast. We may go until nightfall without food. The game is scarce and we dare not venture far into the hills."

Beverly sat at his feet and daintily began the operation of picking a bone with her pretty fingers teeth. "I am sorry we have no knives and forks" he apologized.

"I don't mind"' said she. "I wish you would remove that black patch."

"Alas, I must resume the hated disguise. A chance enemy might recognize me."

"Your--your clothes have been mended," she remarked with a furtive glance at his long legs. The trousers had been rudely sewed up and no bandages were visible. "Are you--your legs terribly hurt???"

"They are badly scratched, but not seriously. The bandages are skilfully placed," he added, seeing her look of doubt. "Ravone is a genius."

"Well, I'll hurry," she said, blus.h.i.+ng deeply. Goat-hunter though he was and she a princess, his eyes gleamed with the joy of her beauty and his heart thumped with a most unruly admiration. "You were very, very brave last night," she said at last--and her rescuer smiled contentedly.

She was not long in finis.h.i.+ng the rude but wholesome meal, and then announced her readiness to be on the way. With the authority of a genuine princess she commanded him to ride inside the coach, gave incomprehensible directions to the driver and to the escort, and would listen to none of his protestations. When the clumsy vehicle was again in the highway and b.u.mping over the ridges of flint, the goat-hunter was beside his princess on the rear seat, his feet upon the opposite cus.h.i.+ons near Aunt f.a.n.n.y, a well-arranged bridge of boxes and bags providing support for his long legs.

"We want to go to a hospital," Beverly had said to the driver, very much as she might have spoken had she been in Was.h.i.+ngton. She was standing bravely beside the forewheel, her face flushed and eager. Baldos, from his serene position on the cus.h.i.+ons, watched her with kindling eyes. The grizzled driver grinned and shook his head despairingly. "Oh, pshaw! You don't understand, do you? Hospital--h-o-s-p-i-t-a-l," she spelt it out for him, and still he shook his head. Others in the motley retinue were smiling broadly.

"Speak to him in your own language, your highness, and he will be sure to understand," ventured the patient.

"I am speaking in my--I mean, I prefer to speak in English. Please tell him to go to a hospital," she said confusedly. Baldos gave a few jovial instructions, and then the raggedest courtier of them all handed Beverly into the carriage with a grace that amazed her.

"You are the most remarkable goat-hunters I have ever seen," she remarked in sincere wonder.

"And you speak the most perfect English I've ever heard," he replied.

"Oh, do you really think so? Miss Grimes used to say I was hopeless. You know I had a--a tutor," she hastily explained. "Don't you think it strange we've met no Axphain soldiers?" she went on, changing the subject abruptly.

"We are not yet out of the woods," he said.

"That was a purely American aphorism," she cried, looking at him intently. "Where did you learn all your English?"

"I had a tutor," he answered easily.

"You are a very odd person," she sighed. "I don't believe that you are a goat-hunter at all."

"If I were not a goat-hunter I should have starved long ago," he said. "Why do you doubt me?"

"Simply because you treat me one moment as if I were a princess, and the next as if I were a child. Humble goat-hunters do not forget their station in life."

"I have much to learn of the deference due to queens," he said.

"That's just like 'The Mikado' or 'Pinafore,'" she exclaimed." I believe you are a comic-opera brigand or a pirate chieftain, after all."

"I am a lowly outcast," he smiled.

"Well, I've decided to take you into Edelweiss and--"

"Pardon me, your highness," he said firmly, "That cannot be. I shall not go to Edelweiss."

"But I command you--"

"It's very kind of you, but I cannot enter a hospital--not even at Ganlook. I may as well confess that I am a hunted man and that the instructions are to take me dead or alive."

"Impossible!" she gasped, involuntarily shrinking from him.

"I have wronged no man, yet I am being hunted down as though I were a beast," he said, his face turning haggard for the moment. "The hills of Graustark, the plateaus of Axphain and the valleys of Dawsbergen are alive with men who are bent on ending my unhappy but inconvenient existence. It would be suicide for me to enter any one of your towns or cities. Even you could not protect me, I fear,"

"This sounds like a dream. Oh, dear me, you don't look like a hardened criminal," she cried.

"I am the humble leader of a faithful band who will die with me when the time comes. We are not criminals, your highness. In return for what service I may have performed for you, I implore you to question me no further. Let me be your slave up to the walls of Ganlook, and then you may forget Baldos, the goat-hunter."

"I never can forget you," she cried, touching his injured arm gently. "Will you forget the one who gave you this wound?"

"It is a very gentle wound, and I love it so that I pray it may never heal." She looked away suddenly.

"Tell me one thing," she said, a mist coming over her eyes. "You say they are hunting you to the death. Then--then your fault must be a grievous one. Have you--have you killed a man?" she added hastily. He was silent for a long time.

"I fear I have killed more than one man," he said in low tones. Again she shrank into the corner of the coach. "History says that your father was a brave soldier and fought in many battles," he went on.

"Yes," she said, thinking of Major George Calhoun.

"He killed men then, perhaps, as I have killed them," he said.

"Oh, my father never killed a man!" cried Beverly, in devout horror.

"Yet Graustark reveres his mighty prowess on the field of battle," said he, half laconically.

"Oh," she murmured, remembering that she was now the daughter of Yetive's father. "I see. You are not a--a--a mere murderer, then?"

"No. I have been a soldier--that is all."

"Thank heaven!" she murmured, and was no longer afraid of him. "Would--would a pardon be of any especial benefit to you?" she asked, wondering how far her influence might go with the Princess Yetive.