but he runs after game you little think of, with his sour, melancholy face, that would scare babes and curdle milk,” answered Lance.
“Thou canst not mean the wenches?” said Whitaker; “why, he hath been melancholy mad with moping for the death of his wife. Thou knowest our lady took the child, for fear he should strangle it for putting him in mind of its mother, in some of his tantrums. Under her favour, and among friends, there are many poor Cavaliers’ children, that care would be better bestowed upon – But to thy tale.”
“Why, thus it runs,” said Lance. “I think you may have noticed, Master Whitaker, that a certain Mistress Deborah hath manifested a certain favour for a certain person in a certain household.”
“For thyself, to wit,” answered Whitaker; “Lance Outram, thou art the vainest coxcomb – ”
“Coxcomb?” said Lance; “why, ‘twas but last night the whole family saw her, as one would say, fling herself at my head.”
“I would she had been a brickbat then, to have broken it, for thy impertinence and conceit,” said the steward.
“Well, but do but hearken. The next morning – that is, this very blessed morning – I thought of going to lodge a buck in the park, judging a bit of venison might be wanted in the larder, after yesterday’s wassail; and, as I passed under the nursery window, I did but just look up to see what madam governante was about; and so I saw her, through the casement, whip on her hood and scarf as soon as she had a glimpse of me. Immediately after I saw the still-room door open, and made sure she was coming through the garden, and so over the breach and down to the park; and so, thought I, ‘Aha, Mistress Deb, if you are so ready to dance after my pipe and tabor, I will give you a couranto before you shall come up with me.’ And so I went down Ivy-tod Dingle, where the copse is tangled, and the ground swampy, and round by Haxley-bottom, thinking all the while she was following, and laughing in my sleeve at the round I was giving her.”
“You deserved to be ducked for it,” said Whitaker, “for a weather-headed puppy; but what is all this Jack-a-lantern story to Bridgenorth?”
“Why, it was all along of he, man,” continued Lance, “that is, of Bridgenorth, that she did not follow me – Gad, I first walked slow, and then stopped, and then turned back a little, and then began to wonder what she had made of herself, and to think I had borne myself something like a jackass in the matter.”
“That I deny,” said Whitaker, “never jackass but would have borne him better – but go on.”
“Why, turning my face towards the Castle, I went back as if I had my nose bleeding, when just by the Copely thorn, which stands, you know, a flight-short from the postern-gate, I saw Madam Deb in close conference with the enemy.”
“What enemy?” said the steward.
“What enemy! why, who but Bridgenorth? They kept out of sight, and among the copse; but, thought I, it is hard if I cannot stalk you, that have stalked so many bucks. If so, I had better give my shafts to be pudding pins. So I cast round the thicket, to watch their waters; and may I never bend crossbow again, if I did not see him give her gold, and squeeze her by the hand!”
“And was that all you saw pass between them?” said the steward.
“Faith, and it was enough to dismount me from my hobby,” said Lance. “What! when I thought I had the prettiest girl in the Castle dancing after my whistle, to find that she gave me the bag to hold, and was smuggling in a corner with a rich old Puritan!”
“Credit me, Lance, it is not as thou thinkest,” said Whitaker. “Bridgenorth cares not for these amorous toys, and thou thinkest of nothing else. But it is fitting our Knight should know that he has met with Deborah in secret, and given her gold; for never Puritan gave gold yet, but it was earnest for some devil’s work done, or to be done.”
“Nay, but,” said Lance, “I would not be such a dog-bolt as to go and betray the girl to our master. She hath a right to follow her fancy, as the dame said who kissed her cow – only I do not much approve her choice, that is all. He cannot be six years short of fifty; and a verjuice countenance, under the penthouse of a slouched beaver, and bag of meagre dried bones, swaddled up in a black cloak, is no such temptation, methinks.”
“I tell you once more,” said Whitaker, “you are mistaken; and that there neither is, nor can be, any matter of love between them, but only some intrigue, concerning, perhaps, this same noble Countess of Derby. I tell thee, it behoves my master to know it, and I will presently tell it to him.”
So saying, and in spite of all the remonstrances which Lance continued to make on behalf of Mistress Deborah, the steward rode up to the main body of their little party, and mentioned to the Knight, and the Countess of Derby, what he had just heard from the keeper, adding at the same time his own suspicions, that Master Bridgenorth of Moultrassie Hall was desirous to keep up some system of espial in the Castle of Martindale, either in order to secure his menaced vengeance on the Countess of Derby, as authoress of his brother-in-law’s death, or for some unknown, but probably sinister purpose.
The Knight of the Peak was filled with high resentment at Whitaker’s communication. According to his prejudices, those of the opposite faction were supposed to make up by wit and intrigue what they wanted in open force; and he now hastily conceived that his neighbour, whose prudence he always respected, and sometimes even dreaded, was maintaining for his private purposes, a clandestine correspondence with a member of his family. If this was for the betrayal of his noble guest, it argued at once treachery and presumption; or, viewing the whole as Lance had done, a criminal intrigue with a woman so near the person of Lady Peveril, was in itself, he deemed, a piece of sovereign impertinence and disrespect on the part of such a person as Bridgenorth, against whom Sir Geoffrey’s anger was kindled accordingly.
Whitaker had scarce regained his post in the rear, when he again quitted it, and galloped to the main body with more speed than before, with the unpleasing tidings that they were pursued by half a score of horseman, and better.
“Ride on briskly to Hartley-nick,” said the Knight, “and there, with God to help, we will bide the knaves. – Countess of Derby – one word and a short one – Farewell! – you must ride forward with Whitaker and another careful fellow, and let me alone to see that no one treads on your skirts.”
“I will abide with you and stand them,” said the Countess; “you know of old, I fear not to look on man’s work.”
“You must ride on, madam,” said the Knight, “for the sake of the young Earl, and the rest of my noble friends’ family. There is no manly work which can be worth your looking upon; it is but child’s play that these fellows bring with them.”
As she yielded a reluctant consent to continue her flight, they reached the bottom of Hartley-nick, a pass very steep and craggy, and where the road, or rather path, which had hitherto passed over more open ground, became pent up and confined betwixt copsewood on the one side, and, on the other, the precipitous bank of a mountain stream.
The Countess of Derby, after an affectionate adieu to Sir Geoffrey, and having requested him to convey her kind commendations to her little page-elect and his mother, proceeded up the pass at a round pace, and with her attendants and escort, was soon out of sight. Immediately after she had disappeared, the pursuers came up with Sir Geoffrey Peveril, who had divided and drawn up his party so as completely to occupy the road at three different points.
The opposite party was led, as Sir Geoffrey had expected, by Major Bridgenorth. At his side was a person in black, with a silver greyhound on his arm; and he was followed by about eight or ten inhabitants
