CHAPTER NINETEEN.
IN THE MIDST OF A MOB.
The people who had followed the soldiers were still outside the haw-haw;a file of troopers having been stationed by its gate to prevent theirpassing through. They could easily have sprung over out of the _fosse_,but for some reason seemed not to care for it.
Lunsford, after dismounting, had rushed up into the porch, but too lateto hinder the shutting of the door; at which he was now thundering andthreatening to adopt the alternative he had been dared to.
"We shall certainly break it in," he cried out in a loud voice, "if notopened instantly."
This elicitating no response from inside, he added,--
"Burst it in, men! Knock it to pieces!"
At which the sergeant and a file of troopers, now also in the porch,commenced hammering away with the butts of their dragon-muzzled muskets.But they might as well have attempted to batter down the wallsthemselves. Not the slightest impression could they make on the strongoaken panels. They were about to desist, when something besides thatcaused them suddenly to suspend their strokes, Lunsford himselfcommanding it. He at the same time sprang down from the porch and backto his saddle, calling on them to do likewise.
Odd as might seem his abrupt abandonment of the door-breaking design,there was no mystery in it. A cry sent up by the crowd of people hadgiven him notice of something new; and that something he now saw in theshape of four horsemen sweeping round from the rear of the house. Thesewere also outside the haw-haw, having crossed it by another causeway atback. A second shout greeted them as they got round to the front, anddrew bridle in the midst of the crowd--a cheer in which new voicesjoined; those of the Ruardean men, just arrived upon the ground.
"Foresters?" cried Sir Richard, as they gathered in a ring around him,"will you allow Ambrose Powell to be plundered--your best friend? Andby Sir John Wintour--your worst enemy?"
"No--never! That we won't?" answered a score of voices.
"Well, the soldiers you see there are Sir John's, from Lydney, thoughwearing the King's uniform?"
"We know 'em--too well!"
"Have seen their ugly faces afore."
"Curse Sir John, an' the King too?" were some of the responses showeredback. Then one, delivering himself in less disjointed but equallyungrammatical phrase, took up the part of spokesman, saying,--
"We've niver had a hour o' peace since Sir John Wintour ha' been headman o' the Forest. He've robbed us o' our rights that be old as theForest itself, keeps on robbin' us; claims the mines, an' the timber,an' the grazin' as all his own. An' the deer, too! Yes, the deer; thewild anymals as should belong to everybody free-born o' the Manor o'Saint Briavel's. I'm that myself, an' stan' up here afore ye all tomake protest agaynst his usurpins."
That the speaker was Rob Wilde might be deduced from allusion to thedeer, pronounced with special emphasis. And he it was.
"We join you in your protest, Rob; an'll stan' by you!" cried one.
"Yes! All of us!" exclaimed another.
"An' we'll help enforce it," came from a third. "If need be, now on thespot. We only want some 'un as'll show us the way--tell us what to do."
At this all eyes turned on Sir Richard. Though personally a stranger tomost of them, all knew him by name, and something more--knew how he haddeclared for Parliament and people, against King and Court, and that itwas no mere private quarrel between him and Sir John Wintour which hadcaused him to speak as he had done.
"Theer be the gentleman who'll do all that," said Rob, pointing to theknight. "The man to help us in gettin' back our rights an' redressin'our wrong. If he can't, nobody else can. But he can and will. He ha'told some o' us, as much."
Another huzza hailed this declaration, for they knew Rob spoke withauthority. And their excitement rose to a still higher pitch, when theknight, responding, said,--
"My brave Foresters! Thanks for the confidence you give me. I know allyour grievances, and am ready to do what I can to help you in rightingthem. And it had best begin now, on the spot, as some one has justsaid. Are _you_ ready to back me in teaching these usurpers a lesson?"
"Ready! That we be, every man o' us."
"Try us, an' see!"
"Only let's ha' the word from you, sir, an' well fall on 'em at once!"
"We're Foresters; we an't afeerd o' no soldiers--not sich raws as them,anyhow."
"Enough!" cried the knight, his eyes aglow as with triumph alreadyachieved; for he now felt assured of it. Over two hundred of theForesters against less than a sixth of that number of Lunsford'shirelings, he had no fear for the result, if fight they must. So, whenhe placed himself at their head, with Eustace Trevor by his side, theirtwo armed attendants behind, and rode up to the gate guarded by the twotroopers, he made no request for these to open it and let them pass in,but a demand, with sword unsheathed, and at back a forest of pikes toenforce it.
The guards at once gave way. Had they not, in another instant theywould have been hoisted out of their saddles on the blades of weaponswith shafts ten feet long. Alive to this danger, they briskly abandonedtheir post, giving the Foresters free passage through the gate.
During all this time the ex-Lieutenant of the Tower had scarce moved aninch from the spot where he remounted his horse. When he saw the fourhorsemen coming around the house, heard the enthusiastic shout hailingthem, at the same time caught sight of the pikes and barbed halberds,whose blades of steel gleamed above the heads of the huzzaing crowd, hisheart sank within him. For this brutal monster, "Bloody Lunsford" as heafterwards came to be called, was craven as cruel. He had swaggered atthe front door as inside the Parliament House by the King's command; butthere was no King at his back now, and his swaggering forsook him on theinstant. He knew something of the character of the Foresters--his rawrecruits knew them better--at a glance saw his troop overmatched, and,if it came to fighting, would be overpowered. But there was no fight,either in himself or his following; and all sat in their saddles sullenand scowling, but cowed-like as wolves just taken in a trap.