CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
"DEAR LITTLE MER."
"Turn and turn, sister," said Sabrina, as she rode up. "You've hadsport enough with your great eagles. Suppose we go up to the hill, andgive my dear little Mer a cast-off?"
"Dear little Mer" was a merlin, that sate perched on her left wrist, insize to the peregrines as a bantam cock to the biggest of chanticleers.Withal a true falcon, and game as the gamest of them.
Why its mistress proposed changing the scene of their sport was that nolarks nor buntings--the merlin's special quarry--were to be met with bythe marsh. Their habitat was higher up on the ridge, where there was atract bare of trees--part pasture, part fallow.
To her sister's very reasonable request Vaga did not give the readiestassent. The petted young lady looked, and likely felt, some littlevexed at her _tete-a-tete_ with Eustace Trevor having been so abruptlybrought to an end. It had promised to make that spot--amid reeds andrushes though it was--hallowed to her, as another on the summit of acertain hill, among hazels and hollies, had been made to her sister.Whatever her thoughts, she showed reluctance to leave the low ground,saying in rejoinder,--
"Oh! certainly, Sab. But won't you wait till the dogs have finishedbeating the sedge?"
"If you wish it, of course. But you don't expect them to find anotherheron?"
"No; but there may be a widgeon or wild duck. After such an easyvictory, I'm sure my pers would like to have another flight. See howthey chafe at their hoods and pull upon the jesses! Ah, my beauties!you want to hear the _hooha-ha-ha-ha_ again--that do you."
"Oh! let them, then," said the more compliant Sabrina, "if the dogs putup anything worth flying them at; which I doubt their doing. We've madetoo much noise for that."
The conjecture of the sage sister proved correct. For the marsh,quartered to its remotest corners, yielded neither widgeons nor wildducks; only moor-hens and water-rails--quarry too contemptible to flythe great falcons at.
"Now," said Sabrina, "I suppose you'll consent to the climbing?"
Her motto might have been _Excelsior_; she seemed always urging anuphill movement.
But there was no longer any objection made to it; and the canines beingcalled out of the sedge, all entered the forest, riders and followersafoot, and commenced winding by a wood-path up the steep acclivity ofRuardean's ridge.
When upon its crest, which they soon after reached, the grand panoramaalready spoken of lay spread before their eyes. For they were on thesame spot from which the young ladies had viewed it that day when Hectorharassed the donkey. Neither of them bestowed a look upon it now; nordid Sabrina even glance at that road winding down from the Wilderness,off which on the former occasion she had been unable to take her eyes.Its interest for her no longer had existence; he who had invested itwith such being by her side. Now she but thought of showing off thecapabilities of "dear little Mer," as in fondness she was accustomed tocall the diminutive specimen of the _falconidae_.
Ere long Mer made exhibition of her high strain and training--for thelittle falcon was also a female--sufficient to prove herself neither_tercel_ nor _haggard_. First she raked down a lark, then a cornbunting; and at the third cast-off overtook and bound on to aturtle-dove, big as herself. For all she speedily brought it to theearth, there instantly killing it.
Just as she had brought this quarry to ground a cry was heard, whichcaused interruption of the sport,--
"Soldiers!"
It was the falconer who so exclaimed; for now that they weremerlin-flying his services were scarce required, and one of his aids didthe whistling and whooping. Left at leisure to look around, his eyeshad strayed up the road beyond Drybrook, there to see what had calledforth his cry.
Instantly all other eyes went the same way, more than one voicemuttering in confirmation,--
"Yes; they're soldiers."
This was evident from their uniformity of dress--all alike, or nearly--as also by the glancing of arms and accoutrements. Moreover, they werein military formation, riding in file, "by twos"--for they were onhorseback.
At sight of them all thoughts of sport were at an end, and the hawkingwas instantly discontinued. Mer, lured back to her mistress's wrist,was once more hooded, and the leash run through the _varvels_ of herjesses; while the falconer and his helps, with the other attendants,gathered into a group preparatory to leaving the field.
Meanwhile, by no accident, but evidently from previous understanding,Sir Richard Walwyn and Eustace Trevor had drawn their horses together,at some distance from the spot occupied by the ladies, the knightsaying,--
"It's Wintour's troop from Lydney, I take it. What do _you_ think,Master Trevor?"
"The same as yourself. Nay, more, I'm sure of it, now. That's mycousin Rej at their head, on the grey mare, with the red feathers in hishat. You remember them?"
"I do. You're right; 'tis he. Somebody beside him, though, who appearsto be in command. Don't you see him turn in his saddle, as thoughcalling back orders?"
"Yes, yes;" was the repetitive rejoinder, Eustace Trevor, despite hislate sojourn at Court, still retaining some of the idiomatic forms ofWelsh colloquy. "But who are those in the rear?" he added,interrogatively.
His question had reference to a number of men afoot, neither in uniformnor formation, who were seen coming behind the horse troop, pressingclose upon its heels. Women among them, too, as could be told by thebrighter hues and looser draping of their dresses.
"People from Mitcheldean," answered Sir Richard, "following the troopout of curiosity, no doubt."
The knight knew better; knew that, but for himself, and some action hehad lately taken, the people spoken of, or at least the majority ofthem, would not have been there. For, since his arrival at Hollymead,he had made many excursions unaccompanied--save by his henchman,Hubert--to Mitcheldean, Coleford, and other Forest centres, where he hadheld converse with many people--spoken words of freedom, which had foundready and assenting response. Therefore, as he now gazed at that crowdof civilians coming on after the soldiers, though his glance was one ofinquiry, it was not as to who they were who composed it, but to makeestimate of their numbers, at the same time comparing it with thestrength of the troop.
There was no time left him to arrive at any exactitude. The horsemenwere on the way to Hollymead, for sure; and he must needs be therebefore--long before them.
So the hawking party made no longer stay on Ruardean Hill, but a startand return homeward--so rapid as to seem retreat; the understrappers andother attendants wondering why it was so--all save Hubert.