CHAPTER X
A CONFESSOR
Sir Nicholas and the party were lodged at East Grinsted the night oftheir arrest, in the magistrate's house. Although he was allowed privacyin his room, after he had given his word of honour not to attempt anescape, yet he was allowed no conversation with Mr. Stewart or his ownservant except in the presence of the magistrate or one of thepursuivants; and Mr. Stewart, since he was personally unknown to themagistrate, and since the charge against him was graver, was not on anyaccount allowed to be alone for a moment, even in the room in which heslept. The following day they all rode on to London, and the twoprisoners were lodged in the Marshalsea. This had been for a long whilethe place where Bishop Bonner was confined; and where Catholic prisonerswere often sent immediately after their arrest; and Sir Nicholas at anyrate found to his joy that he had several old friends among theprisoners. He was confined in a separate room; but by the kindness of hisgaoler whom he bribed profusely as the custom was, through his servant,he had many opportunities of meeting the others; and even of approachingthe sacraments and hearing mass now and then.
He began a letter to his wife on the day of his arrival and finished itthe next day which was Saturday, and it was taken down immediately by thecourier who had heard the news and had called at the prison. In fact, hewas allowed a good deal of liberty; although he was watched and hisconversation listened to, a good deal more than he was aware. Mr.Stewart, however, as he still called himself, was in a much harder case.The saddle-bags had been opened on his arrival, and incriminatingdocuments found. Besides the "popish trinkets" they were found to containa number of "seditious pamphlets," printed abroad for distribution inEngland; for at this time the College at Douai, under its founder Dr.William Allen, late Principal of St. Mary's Hall, Oxford, was active inthe production of literature; these were chiefly commentaries on theBull; as well as exhortations to the Catholics to stand firm and topersevere in recusancy, and to the schismatic Catholics, as they werecalled, to give over attending the services in the parish churches. Therewere letters also from Dr. Storey himself, whom the authorities alreadyhad in person under lock and key at the Tower. These were quitesufficient to make Mr. Stewart a prize; and he also was very shortlyafterwards removed to the Tower.
Sir Nicholas wrote a letter at least once a week to his wife; but writingwas something of a labour to him; it was exceedingly doubtful to his mindwhether his letters were not opened and read before being handed to thecourier, and as his seal was taken from him his wife could not telleither. However they seemed to arrive regularly; plainly therefore theauthorities were either satisfied with their contents or else did notthink them worth opening or suppressing. He was quite peremptory that hiswife should not come up to London; it would only increase his distress,he said; and he liked to think of her at Maxwell Hall; there were otherreasons too that he was prudent enough not to commit to paper, and whichshe was prudent enough to guess at, the principal of which was, ofcourse, that she ought to be there for the entertaining and helping ofother agents or priests who might be in need of shelter.
The old man got into good spirits again very soon. It pleased him tothink that God had honoured him by imprisonment; and he said as much onceor twice in his letters to his wife. He was also pleased with a sense ofthe part he was playing in the _role_ of a conspirator; and he underlinedand put signs and exclamation marks all over his letters of which hethought his wife would understand the significance, but no one else;whereas in reality the old lady was sorely puzzled by them, and theauthorities who opened the letters generally read them of course like aprinted book.
One morning about ten days after his arrival the Governor of the prisonlooked in with the gaoler, and announced to Sir Nicholas, after greetinghim, that he was to appear before the Council that very day. This, ofcourse, was what Sir Nicholas desired, and he thanked the Governorcordially for his good news.
"They will probably keep you at the Tower, Sir Nicholas," said theGovernor, "and we shall lose you. However, sir, I hope you will be morecomfortable there than we have been able to make you."
The knight thanked the Governor again, and said good-day to him withgreat warmth; for they had been on the best of terms with one anotherduring his short detention at the Marshalsea.
The following day Sir Nicholas wrote a long letter to his wife describinghis examination.
"We are in _royal lodgings_ here at last, sweetheart; Mr. Boyd brought myluggage over yesterday; and I am settled _for the present_ in a room ofmy own in the White Tower; with a prospect over the Court. I was hadbefore my lords yesterday in the Council-room; we drove hither from theMarshalsea. There was a bay window in the room. I promise you they gotlittle enough from me. There was my namesake, Sir Nicholas Bacon, mylords Leicester and Pembroke, and Mr. Secretary Cecil; Sir James Crofts,the Controller of the Household, and one or two more; but these were theprincipal. I was set before the table on a chair alone with none to guardme; but with men at the doors I knew very well. My lords were verycourteous to me; though they laughed more than was seemly at such gravetimes. They questioned me much as to my religion. Was I a papist? If theymeant by that a _Catholic_, that I was, and thanked God for it everyday--(those nicknames like me not). Was I then a recusant? If by thatthey meant, Did I go to their Genevan Hotch-Potch? That I did not nornever would. I thought to have said a word here about St. Cyprian hiswork _De Unitate Ecclesiae_, as F----r X. told me, but they would not letme speak. Did I know Mr. Chapman? If by that they meant Mr. Stewart, thatI did, and for a courteous God-fearing gentleman too. Was he a Papist, ora Catholic if I would have it so? That I would not tell them; let themfind that out with their pursuivants and that crew. Did I thinkProtestants to be fearers of God? That I did not; they feared nought butthe Queen's Majesty, so it seemed to me. Then they all laughed at once--Iknow not why. Then they grew grave; and Mr. Secretary began to ask mequestions, sharp and hard; but I would not be put upon, and answered himagain as he asked. Did I know ought of Dr. Storey? Nothing, said I, savethat he is a good Catholic, and that they had taken him. _He is aseditious rogue_, said my Lord Pembroke. _That he is not_, said I. Thenthey asked me what I thought of the Pope and his Bull, and whether he candepose princes. I said I thought him to be the Vicar of Christ; and as tohis power to depose princes, that I supposed he could do, if he said so.Then two or three cried out on me that I had not answered honestly; andat that I got wrath; and then they laughed again, at least I saw SirJames Crofts at it. And Mr. Secretary, looking very hard at me askedwhether if Philip sent an armament against Elizabeth to depose her, Iwould fight for him or her grace. For neither, said I: I am too old. _Forwhich then would you pray?_ said they. _For the Queen's Grace_, said I,_for that she was my sovereign_. This seemed to content them; and theytalked a little among themselves. They had asked me other questions tooas to my way of living; whether I went to mass. They asked me too alittle more about Mr. Stewart. Did I know him to be a seditious rascal?That I did not, said I. _Then how_, asked they, _did you come to receivehim and his pamphlets?_ Of his pamphlets, said I, I know nothing; I sawnothing in his bags save beads and a few holy books and such things. (Yousee, sweetheart, I did him no injury by saying so, because I knew thatthey had his bags themselves.) And I said I had received him because hewas recommended to me by some good friends of mine abroad, and I toldthem their names too; for they are safe in Flanders now.
"And when they had done their questions they talked again for a while; andI was sent out to the antechamber to refresh myself; and Mr. Secretarysent a man with me to see that I had all I needed; and we talked togethera little, and he said the Council were in good humour at the taking ofDr. Storey; and he had never seen them so merry. Then I was had backagain presently; and Mr. Secretary said I was to stay in the Tower; andthat Mr. Boyd was gone already to bring my things. And so after that Iwent by water to the Tower, and here I am, sweetheart, well and cheerful,praise God....
"My dearest, I send you my heart's bes
t love. God have you in his holykeeping."
The Council treated the old knight very tenderly. They were shrewd enoughto see his character very plainly; and that he was a simple man who knewnothing of sedition, but only had harboured agents thinking them to be asguileless as himself. As a matter of fact, Mr. Stewart was an agent ofDr. Storey's; and was therefore implicated in a number of very gravecharges. This of course was a very serious matter; but both in theexamination of the Council, and in papers in Mr. Stewart's bags, nothingcould be found to implicate Sir Nicholas in any political intrigue atall. The authorities were unwilling too to put such a man to the torture.There was always a possibility of public resentment against the tortureof a man for his religion alone; and they were desirous not to arousethis, since they had many prisoners who would be more productive subjectsof the rack than a plainly simple and loyal old man whose only crime washis religion. They determined, however, to make an attempt to get alittle more out of Sir Nicholas by a device which would excite noresentment if it ever transpired, and one which was more suited to theold man's nature and years.
Sir Nicholas thus described it to his wife.
"Last night, my dearest, I had a great honour and consolation. I wasawakened suddenly towards two o'clock in the morning by the door of myroom opening and a man coming in. It was somewhat dark, and I could notsee the man plainly, but I could see that he limped and walked with astick, and he breathed hard as he entered. I sat up and demanded of himwho he was and what he wanted; and telling me to be still, he said thathe was Dr. Storey. You may be sure, sweetheart, that I sprang up at that;but he would not let me rise; and himself sat down beside me. He saidthat by the _kindness_ of a gaoler he had been allowed to come; and thathe must not stay with me long; that he had heard of me from his goodfriend Mr. Stewart. I asked him how he did, for I heard that he had beenracked; and he said yes, it was true; but that by the mercy of God andthe prayers of the saints he had held his peace and they knew nothingfrom him. Then he asked me a great number of questions about the _men Ihad entertained_, and where they were now; and he knew many of theirnames. Some of them were friends of his own, he said; especially thepriests. We talked a good while, till the morning light began; and thenhe said he must be gone or the head gaoler would know of his visit, andso he went. I wish I could have seen his face, sweetheart, for I thinkhim a great servant of God; but it was still too dark when he went, andwe dared not have a light for fear it should be seen."
This was as a matter of fact a ruse of the authorities. It was not Dr.Storey at all who was admitted to Sir Nicholas' prison, but Parker, whohad betrayed him at Antwerp. It was so successful, for Sir Nicholas toldhim all that he knew (which was really nothing at all) that it wasrepeated a few months later with richer results; when the conspiratorBaily, hysterical and almost beside himself with the pain of the rack,under similar circumstances gave up a cypher which was necessary to theCouncil in dealing with the correspondence of Mary Stuart. However, SirNicholas never knew the deception, and to the end of his days was proudthat he had actually met the famous Dr. Storey, when they were bothimprisoned in the Tower together, and told his friends of it withreverent pride when the doctor was hanged a year later.
Hubert, who had been sent for to take charge of the estate, had come toLondon soon after his father's arrival at the Tower; and was allowed aninterview with him in the presence of the Lieutenant. Hubert was greatlyaffected; though he could not look upon the imprisonment with the samesolemn exultation as that which his father had; but it made a realimpression upon him to find that he took so patiently this separationfrom home and family for the sake of religion. Hubert receivedinstructions from Sir Nicholas as to the management of the estate, for itwas becoming plain that his father would have to remain in the Tower forthe present; not any longer on a really grave charge, but chiefly becausehe was an obstinate recusant and would promise nothing. The law and itsadministration at this time were very far apart; the authorities were notvery anxious to search out and punish those who were merely recusants orrefused to take the oath of supremacy; and so Hubert and Mr. Boyd andother Catholics were able to come and go under the very nose of justicewithout any real risk to themselves; but it was another matter to let asturdy recusant go from prison who stoutly refused to give any sort ofpromise or understanding as to future behaviour.
Sir Nicholas was had down more than once to further examination beforethe Lords Commissioners in the Lieutenant's house; but it was a very tameand even an amusing affair for all save Sir Nicholas. It was so easy toprovoke him; he was so simple and passionate that they could get almostanything they wanted out of him by a little adroit baiting; and more thanonce his examination formed a welcome and humorous entr'acte between tworeal tragedies. Sir Nicholas, of course, never suspected for a momentthat he was affording any amusement to any one. He thought their wearylaughter to be sardonic and ironical, and he looked upon himself as avery desperate fellow indeed; and wrote glowing accounts of it all to hiswife, full of apostrophic praises to God and the saints, in a hand thatshook with excitement and awe at the thought of the important scenes inwhich he played so prominent a part.
But there was no atmosphere of humour about Mr. Stewart. He haddisappeared from Sir Nicholas' sight on their arrival at the Marshalsea,and they had not set eyes on one another since; nor could all theknight's persuasion and offer of bribes make his gaoler consent to takeany message or scrap of paper between them. He would not even answer morethan the simplest inquiries about him,--that he was alive and in theTower, and so forth; and Sir Nicholas prayed often and earnestly for thatdeliberate and vivacious young man who had so charmed and interested themall down at Great Keynes, and who had been so mysteriously engulfed bythe sombre majesty of the law.
"I fear," he wrote to Lady Maxwell, "I fear that _our friend_ must besick or dying. But I can hear no news of him; when I am allowed sometimesto walk in the court or on the leads he is never there. My _attendant_Mr. Jakes looks glum and says nothing when I ask him how my friend does.My dearest, do not forget him in your prayers nor your old loving husbandeither."
One evening late in October Mr. Jakes did not come as usual to bring SirNicholas his supper at five o'clock; the time passed and still he did notcome. This was very unusual. Presently Mrs. Jakes appeared instead,carrying the food which she set down at the door while she turned the keybehind her. Sir Nicholas rallied her on having turned gaoler; but sheturned on him a face with red eyes and lined with weeping.
"O Sir Nicholas," she said, for these two were good friends, "what awicked place this is! God forgive me for saying so; but they've had thatyoung man down there since two o'clock; and Jakes is with them to help;and he told me to come up to you, Sir Nicholas, with your supper, if theyweren't done by five; and if the young gentleman hadn't said what theywanted."
Sir Nicholas felt sick.
"Who is it?" he asked.
"Why, who but Mr. Stewart?" she said; and then fell weeping again, andwent out forgetting to lock the door behind her in her grief. SirNicholas sat still a moment, sick and shaken; he knew what it meant; butit had never come so close to him before. He got up presently and went tothe door to listen for he knew not what. But there was no sound but themoan of the wind up the draughty staircase, and the sound of a prisonersinging somewhere above him a snatch of a song. He looked out presently,but there was nothing but the dark well of the staircase disappearinground to the left, and the glimmer of an oil lamp somewhere from thedepths below him, with wavering shadows as the light was blown about bythe gusts that came up from outside. There was nothing to be done ofcourse; he closed the door, went back and prayed with all his might forthe young man who was somewhere in this huge building, in his agony.
Mr. Jakes came up himself within half an hour to see if all was well; butsaid nothing of his dreadful employment or of Mr. Stewart; and SirNicholas did not like to ask for fear of getting Mrs. Jakes into trouble.The gaoler took away the supper things, wished him good-night, went outand locked the door, apparently without noti
cing it had been left undonebefore. Possibly his mind was too much occupied with what he had beenseeing and doing. And the faithful account of all this went down in duetime to Great Keynes.
The arrival of the courier at the Hall on Wednesday and Saturday was agreat affair both to the household and to the village. Sir Nicholas senthis letter generally by the Saturday courier, and the other brought akind of bulletin from Mr. Boyd, with sometimes a message or two from hismaster. These letters were taken by the ladies first to the study, as ifto an oratory, and Lady Maxwell would read them slowly over to hersister. And in the evening, when Isabel generally came up for an hour ortwo, the girl would be asked to read them slowly all over again to thetwo ladies who sat over their embroidery on either side of her, and whointerrupted for the sheer joy of prolonging it. And they would discusstogether the exact significance of all his marks of emphasis and irony;and the girl would have all she could do sometimes not to feel a disloyalamusement at the transparency of the devices and the simplicity of theloving hearts that marvelled at the writer's depth and ingenuity. But shewas none the less deeply impressed by his courageous cheerfulness, and bythe power of a religion that in spite of its obvious weaknesses andimprobabilities yet inspired an old man like Sir Nicholas with so muchfortitude.
At first, too, a kind of bulletin was always issued on the Sunday andThursday mornings, and nailed upon the outside of the gatehouse, so thatany who pleased could come there and get first-hand information; and aninterpreter stood there sometimes, one of the educated younger sons ofMr. Piers, and read out to the groups from Lady Maxwell's sprawling oldhandwriting, news of the master.
"Sir Nicholas has been had before the Council," he read out one day in ahigh complacent voice to the awed listeners, "and has been sent to theTower of London." This caused consternation in the village, as it wassupposed by the country-folk, not without excuse, that the Tower was theantechamber of death; but confidence was restored by the furtherannouncement a few lines down that "he was well and cheerful."
Great interest, too, was aroused by more domestic matters.
"Sir Nicholas," it was proclaimed, "is in a little separate chamber ofhis own. Mr. Jakes, his gaoler, seems an honest fellow. Sir Nicholas hatha little mattress from a friend that Mr. Boyd fetched for him. He hasdinner at eleven and supper at five. Sir Nicholas hopes that all are wellin the village."
But other changes had followed the old knight's arrest. The furiousindignation in the village against the part that the Rectory had playedin the matter, made it impossible for the Dents to remain there. That theminister's wife should have been publicly ducked, and that not by a fewblackguards but by the solid fathers and sons with the applause of thewives and daughters, made her husband's position intolerable, and furtherevidence was forthcoming in the behaviour of the people towards theRector himself; some boys had guffawed during his sermon on the followingSunday, when he had ventured on a word or two of penitence as to hisshare in the matter, and he was shouted after on his way home.
Mrs. Dent seemed strangely changed and broken during her stay at theHall. She had received a terrible shock, and it was not safe to move herback to her own house. For the first two or three nights, she would startfrom sleep again and again screaming for help and mercy and nothing wouldquiet her till she was wide awake and saw in the fire-light the curtainedwindows and the bolted door, and the kindly face of an old servant orMistress Margaret with her beads in her hand. Isabel, who came up to seeher two or three times, was both startled and affected by the change inher; and by the extraordinary mood of humility which seemed to have takenpossession of the hard self-righteous Puritan.
"I begged pardon," she whispered to the girl one evening, sitting up inbed and staring at her with wide, hard eyes, "I begged pardon of LadyMaxwell, though I am not fit to speak to her. Do you think she can everforgive me? Do you think she can? It was I, you know, who wrought all themischief, as I have wrought all the mischief in the village all theseyears. She said she did, and she kissed me, and said that our Saviour hadforgiven her much more. But--but do you think she has forgiven me?" Andthen again, another night, a day or two before they left the place, shespoke to Isabel again.
"Look after the poor bodies," she said, "teach them a little charity; Ihave taught them nought but bitterness and malice, so they have but givenme my own back again. I have reaped what I have sown."
So the Dents slipped off early one morning before the folk were up; andby the following Sunday, young Mr. Bodder, of whom the Bishop entertaineda high opinion, occupied the little desk outside the chancel arch; andGreat Keynes once more had to thank God and the diocesan that itpossessed a proper minister of its own, and not a mere unordained reader,which was all that many parishes could obtain.
Towards the end of September further hints began to arrive, very muchunderlined, in the knight's letters, of Mr. Stewart and his sufferings.
"You remember _our friend_," Isabel read out one Saturday evening, "_not_Mr. Stewart." (This puzzled the old ladies sorely till Isabel explainedtheir lord's artfulness.) "My dearest, I fear the worst for him. I do notmean apostacy, thank God. But I fear that these _wolves_ have torn himsadly, in their _dens_." Then followed the story of Mrs. Jakes, with allits horror, all the greater from the obscurity of the details.
Isabel put the paper down trembling, as she sat on the rug before thefire in the parlour upstairs, and thought of the bright-eyed, red-hairedman with his steady mouth and low laugh whom Anthony had described toher.
Lady Maxwell posted upon the gatehouse:
"Sir Nicholas fears that a _friend_ is in sore trouble; he hopes he maynot _yield_."
Then, after a few days more, a brief notice with a black-line drawn roundit, that ran, in Mr. Bodder's despite:
"Our _friend_ has passed away. Pray for his soul."
Sir Nicholas had written in great agitation to this effect.
"My sweetheart, I have heavy news to-day. There was a great company offolks below my window to-day, in the Inner Ward, where the road runs upbelow the Bloody Tower. It was about nine of the clock. And there was ahorse there whose head I could see; and presently from the BeauchampTower came, as I thought, an old man between two warders; and then Icould not very well see; the men were in my way; but soon the horse wentoff, and the men after him; and I could hear the groaning of the crowdthat were waiting for them outside. And when Mr. Jakes brought me mydinner at eleven of the clock, he told me it was our friend--(think ofit, my dearest--him whom I thought an old man!)--that had been taken offto Tyburn. And now I need say no more, but bid you pray for his soul."
Isabel could hardly finish reading it; for she heard a quick sobbingbreath behind her, and felt a wrinkled old hand caressing her hair andcheek as her voice faltered.
Meanwhile Hubert was in town. Sir Nicholas had at first intended him togo down at once and take charge of the estate; but Piers was verycompetent, and so his father consented that he should remain in Londonuntil the beginning of October; and this too better suited Mr. Norris'plans who wished to send Isabel off about the same time to Northampton.
When Hubert at last did arrive, he soon showed himself extremely capableand apt for the work. He was out on the estate from morning till night onhis cob, and there was not a man under him from Piers downwards who hadanything but praise for his insight and industry.
There was in Hubert, too, as there so often is in country-boys who loveand understand the life of the woods and fields, a balancing quality of adeep vein of sentiment; and this was now consecrated to Isabel Norris. Hehad pleasant dreams as he rode home in the autumn evening, under thesweet keen sky where the harvest moon rose large and yellow over thehills to his left and shed a strange mystical light that blended in akind of chord with the dying daylight. It was at times like that, whenthe air was fragrant with the scent of dying leaves, with perhaps a touchof frost in it, and the cottages one by one opened red glowing eyes inthe dusk, that the boy began to dream of a home of his own and pleasantdomestic joys; of burning logs on the hearth
and lighted candles, and adear slender figure moving about the room. He used to rehearse to himselflittle meetings and partings; look at the roofs of the Dower Houseagainst the primrose sky as he rode up the fields homewards; identify herwindow, dark now as she was away; and long for Christmas when she wouldbe back again. The only shadow over these delightful pictures was theuncertainty as to the future. Where after all would the home be? For hewas a younger son. He thought about James very often. When he came backwould he live at home? Would it all be James' at his father's death,these woods and fields and farms and stately house? Would it ever come tohim? And, meanwhile where should he and Isabel live, when the religiousdifficulty had been surmounted, as he had no doubt that it would besooner or later?
When he thought of his father now, it was with a continually increasingrespect. He had been inclined to despise him sometimes before, as one ofa simple and uneventful life; but now the red shadow of the Law conferreddignity. To have been imprisoned in the Tower was a patent of nobility,adding distinction and gravity to the commonplace. Something of the gloryeven rested on Hubert himself as he rode and hawked with other Catholicboys, whose fathers maybe were equally zealous for the Faith, but lessdistinguished by suffering for it.
Before Anthony went back to Cambridge, he and Hubert went out nearlyevery day together with or without their hawks. Anthony was about threeyears the younger, and Hubert's additional responsibility for the estatemade the younger boy more in awe of him than the difference in their ageswarranted. Besides, Hubert knew quite as much about sport, and had moreopportunities for indulging his taste for it. There was no heronry athand; besides, it was not the breeding time which is the proper seasonfor this particular sport; so they did not trouble to ride out to one;but the partridges and hares and rabbits that abounded in the Maxwellestate gave them plenty of quarreys. They preferred to go out generallywithout the falconer, a Dutchman, who had been taken into the service ofSir Nicholas thirty years before when things had been more prosperous; itwas less embarrassing so; but they would have a lad to carry the "cadge,"and a pony following them to carry the game. They added to the excitementof the sport by making it a competition between their birds; and flyingthem one after another, or sometimes at the same quarry, as in coursing;but this often led to the birds' crabbing.
Anthony's peregrine Eliza was almost unapproachable; and the lad was themore proud of her as he had "made" her himself, as an "eyess" or youngfalcon captured as a nestling. But, on the other hand, Hubert's goshawkMargaret, a fiery little creature, named inappropriately enough after histranquil aunt, as a rule did better than Anthony's Isabel, and broughtthe scores level again.
There was one superb day that survived long in Anthony's memory andconversation; when he had done exceptionally well, when Eliza hadsurpassed herself, and even Isabel had acquitted herself with credit. Itwas one of those glorious days of wind and sun that occasionally fall inearly October, with a pale turquoise sky overhead, and air that seems tosparkle and intoxicate like wine. They went out together after dinnerabout noon; their ponies and spaniels danced with the joy of life; LadyMaxwell cried to them from the north terrace to be careful, and pointedout to Mr. Norris who had dined with them what a graceful seat Huberthad; and then added politely, but as an obvious afterthought, thatAnthony seemed to manage his pony with great address. The boys turned offthrough the village, and soon got on to high ground to the west of thevillage and all among the stubble and mustard, with tracts of rich sunlitcountry, of meadows and russet woodland below them on every side. Thenthe sport began. It seemed as if Eliza could not make a mistake. Thererose a solitary partridge forty yards away with a whirl of wings; (thecoveys were being well broken up by now) Anthony unhooded his bird and"cast off," with the falconer's cry "Hoo-ha, ha, ha, ha," and up soaredEliza with the tinkle of bells, on great strokes of those mighty wings,up, up, behind the partridge that fled low down the wind for his life.The two ponies were put to the gallop as the peregrine began to "stoop";and then down like a plummet she fell with closed wings, "raked" thequarry with her talons as she passed; recovered herself, and as Anthonycame up holding out the _tabur-stycke_, returned to him and was hoodedand leashed again; and sat there on his gloved wrist with wet claws, justshivering slightly from her nerves, like the aristocrat she was; whileher master stroked her ashy back and the boy picked up the quarry,admiring the deep rent before he threw it into the pannier.
Then Hubert had the next turn; but his falcon missed his first stoop, anddid not strike the quarry till the second attempt, thus scoring one toAnthony's account. Then the peregrines were put back on the cadge as theboys got near to a wide meadow in a hollow where the rabbits used tofeed; and the goshawks Margaret and Isabel were taken, each in turnsitting unhooded on her master's wrist, while they all watched the longthin grass for the quick movement that marked the passage of arabbit;--and then in a moment the bird was cast off. The goshawk wouldrise just high enough to see the quarry in the grass, then fly straightwith arched wings and pounces stretched out as she came over the quarry;then striking him between the shoulders would close with him; and hermaster would come up and take her off, throw the rabbit to thegame-carrier; and the other would have the next attempt.
And so they went on for three or four hours, encouraging their birds,whooping the death of the quarry, watching with all the sportsman'skeenness the soaring and stooping of the peregrines, the raking off ofthe goshawks; listening to the thrilling tinkle of the bells, and takingback their birds to sit triumphant and complacent on their master'swrists, when the quarry had been fairly struck, and furious and sullenwhen it had eluded them two or three times till their breath left them inthe dizzy rushes, and they "canceliered" or even returned disheartenedand would fly no more till they had forgotten--till at last the shadowsgrew long, and the game more wary, and the hawks and ponies tired; andthe boys put up the birds on the cadge, and leashed them to it securely;and jogged slowly homewards together up the valley road that led to thevillage, talking in technical terms of how the merlin's feather must be"imped" to-morrow; and of the relative merits of the "varvels" or littlesilver rings at the end of the jesses through which the leash ran, andthe Dutch swivel that Squire Blackett always used.
As they got nearer home and the red roofs of the Dower House began toglow in the ruddy sunlight above the meadows, Hubert began to shift theconversation round to Isabel, and inquire when she was coming home.Anthony was rather bored at this turn of the talk; but thought she wouldbe back by Christmas at the latest; and said that she was atNorthampton--and had Hubert ever seen such courage as Eliza's? But Hubertwould not be put off; but led the talk back again to the girl; and atlast told Anthony under promise of secrecy that he was fond of Isabel,and wished to make her his wife;--and oh! did Anthony think she caredreally for him. Anthony stared and wondered and had no opinion at all onthe subject; but presently fell in love with the idea that Hubert shouldbe his brother-in-law and go hawking with him every day; and he added aprivate romance of his own in which he and Mary Corbet should be at theDower House, with Hubert and Isabel at the Hall; while the elders, hisown father, Sir Nicholas, Mr. James, Lady Maxwell, and Mistress Torridonhad all taken up submissive and complacent attitudes in the middledistance.
He was so pensive that evening that his father asked him at supperwhether he had not had a good day; which diverted his thoughts fromMistress Corbet, and led him away from sentiment on a stream of his owntalk with long backwaters of description of this and that stoop, and ofexactly the points in which he thought the Maxwells' falconer had failedin the training of Hubert's Jane.
Hubert found a long letter waiting from his father which Lady Maxwellgave him to read, with messages to himself in it about the estate, whichbrought him down again from the treading of rosy cloud-castles with aphantom Isabel whither his hawks and the shouting wind and the happy dayhad wafted him, down to questions of barns and farm-servants and thesober realities of harvest.