The White Horses

  *CHAPTER XVIII.*

  *MARSTON MOOR.*

  Rupert got to horse, and rode through the press and uproar of the camp.Confusion was abroad. To the Cavaliers, though some of them mightregard evensong lightly, it meant at least a truce until the next day'sdawn; and now they were attacked by an enemy who did not scruple tocombine prayer with craftiness. Down from the rye-fields they saw thehorsemen and the footmen come, and only Rupert could have steadied themin this black hour.

  "We meet Cromwell's horse," he cried, getting his own men into line thisside the little ditch, "and, gentlemen, we owe Cromwell many debts."

  Stiff and stour it was, that fight at the ditch. The old, stark battleswere recalled--Crecy, and Agincourt, and Flodden--for it was all atpitiless close quarters. First they exchanged pistol-shots; then,throwing their pistols in each other's faces with a fury already atwhite heat, they fell to with sword and pike. Overhead the storm brokein earnest. The intermittent crackle of gunshots, from thesharpshooters lining the hedges, mingled with the bellow of the thunderand that clamour of hard-fighting men which has the wild beast note.

  Newcastle, asleep in his coach at the far side of the Moor, was rousedby the uproar. He did not know what had chanced, but the waking was ofa piece with the nightmares that had haunted his brief slumber. Hislimbs ached, the weariness of York's long siege was on him, but he ranforward, sword in hand, and asked the first man he met what was in thedoing. Then he sought for his company and could not find them, except ahandful of the gallant Leightons; so he pressed forward, unmounted,crying his name aloud, and asking all who heard him to make up a troop.He gathered drift and flotsam of the running battle--he whose dream hadbeen of a mounted charge, with picked cavalry behind him--and theyfought on the left wing with a wild and cheery gallantry.

  On the right, the Ironsides still faced Rupert's men, and neither wouldgive way. Once, in a lull of the berserk struggle, when either side hadwithdrawn a little to take breath, a great hound pressed his way throughthe Royalists and came yelping forward in search of Rupert. He cameinto the empty space between the King's men and Cromwell's, and agunshot flashed; and Boye struggled on the sodden ground, turned hishead in dying search for Rupert, the well-beloved, and so lay still.

  From the Ironsides a storm of plaudits crossed a sudden thunder-clap."There goes the arch-Papist of them all," came a voice drunk withbattle.

  And something broke at Rupert's heart. It was as if he stood aloneentirely--as if the world were ended, somehow. "Ah, Boye," he murmured.And then he led a charge so furious that the Ironsides all but broke.It was Cromwell rallied them, and for an hour the fight went forward.The hedge was levelled now, and the ditch filled in by the bodies of theslain. Time after time Rupert found himself almost within strikingdistance of Cromwell. They were seeking each other with a settled,fervent purpose. And the fight eddied to and fro; and the rain camedown in wild, unending torrents.

  The chance sought by Rupert came to Michael Metcalf, as it chanced.Pushed to one side of the press, he found himself facing a rough-hewnParliament man in like case, and parried a fierce sword-cut with hispike. Then he drew back the pike, felt it quiver like a live thing inhis hands, and drove it through the other's fleshy neck. It was onlywhen the man wavered in saddle, and he had leisure for a moment'sthought, that he knew his adversary. A trooper of the Parliamentsnatched the wounded rider's bridle, dragged his horse safely to therear, and Michael raised a wild, impulsive shout:

  "Cromwell is down! A Mecca for the King."

  Rupert heard the cry, and drew his men a little away, to get speed forthe gallop. His crashing charge drove back the Roundheads twenty paces,and no more. They were of good and stubborn fibre, and the loss ofCromwell bade them fight with sullen hardihood. At the end of, it mightbe, fifteen minutes they had regained a foot or two of their lostground, and Cromwell, getting his wound bandaged at the thatched cottageup above, asked another wounded Roundhead, who came for the likesuccour, how it fared.

  "As may be," growled the other. "If so thou'rt not dead, as we fancied,get down and hearten them."

  "I've a thick throat, and the pike took the fleshy part," said Cromwell,with a deep, unhumorous laugh. "I'll get down."

  He mounted with some difficulty. Pluck cannot always conquer in amoment great loss of blood and weakness of the body. Once in thesaddle, his strength returned to him; but he rode down too late.Rupert's men had followed their old tactics, had retreated again to gainspeed for the onslaught, and were driving the enemy before them in hotpursuit.

  Cromwell, after narrow escape of being ridden down by his own folk,after vain efforts to rally them again, found himself alone. The woundin his throat was throbbing at its bandages. The rain ran down him inrivulets, and the world seemed filled with thunder and the cries of men.Word reached him that Eythin, too, had broken through, and that allParliament men were bidden to save themselves as best they might. Andso he left the field; and the sickness of defeat, more powerful thanbody-sickness, caught him as he neared the smithy, this side of Tockwithvillage. A farm-lad, returning from selling a cow at Boroughbridge,found him in the roadway, fallen from his horse, and carried him intothe smithy-house. They tended his wound. Within an hour his lustystrength of purpose came to his aid. He asked for meat and ale, andsaid he must get ready for the road. He was known by this time; buteven the blacksmith, Royalist to the core of his big body, would nothinder his going. A man of this breed must be given his chance, hefelt.

  "After all," he muttered, watching Cromwell ride unsteadily down themoonlit road, "they say Marston Moor has lost Yorkshire to theParliament for good and all. Some call him Old Noll, and othersome OldNick--but he'll do little harm i' these parts now, I reckon."

  "A soft heart and a big body--they go always fools in company," said hisgoodwife. "I'd not have let him go so easy, I."

  "Ay, but ye wod, if I'd been for keeping him. Ye're like a weather-cock,daft wife. When I point south, thou'st always for veering round tonorth--or t'other way about, just as it chances."

  Cromwell rode back toward Marston, to find his men. He was kin toRupert in this--disaster or triumph, he must find those who needed him.At the end of a half-mile he met a rider cantering up the rise. Themoonlight was clear and vivid, after the late storm, and the riderpulled his horse up sharply.

  "The battle is ours, General, and I've my Lord Fairfax's orders foryou."

  "The battle is ours?" demanded Cromwell gruffly. "I do not understand."

  "None of us understand. Fairfax was three miles away, sleeping in afarmstead bed-chamber, when we roused him with the news. It wasLeslie's men who broke their centre and drove round Rupert's flank. Thethunder was in all our brains, I fancy."

  Cromwell laughed. All his austerity, his self-pride warring against thehumility he coveted, were broken down, as Rupert's cavalry had been."Then it's for the siege of York again?" he asked.

  "Fairfax says the risk is too great. The Moor is full of our dead, andwe're not strong enough. He bids you get your men together and holdRipley, going wide of Knaresborough--which is a hornet's nest--untilfurther orders reach you. That is my message, General."

  "Good," said Cromwell, tightening the bandage round his throat. "Whereare my men?"

  He found them--those who were left--in scattered companies. And a lustyroar went up as they saw him ride through the moonlight, swaying on thethick farm-cob that carried him.

  "It's fourteen miles to Ripley, lads, but we'll cover it."

  On Marston Moor the Royalists had pursued their advantage to the full.Rupert's men and Eythin's had run wild on the ridge-fields up above.And Leslie saw his chance. With his Scots he charged down on the WhiteCoats, weakened by siege before the fight began. They kept theirpledge; their coats were dyed with crimson martyrdom--and so they diedto a man, resisting Leslie's charge.

  Leslie himself paused when the work was done. "They were mettledthoroughbreds," he said huskily.
"And now, friends, for the ditch thatRupert leaves unguarded."

  It was so, in this incredible turmoil of storm and fight and havoc, thatthe battle of Long Marston was lost to the King. Rupert, getting hismen in hand at long last, returned to face another hand-to-handencounter. With the middlewing past sharing any battle of this world,the affair was hopeless. Rupert would not admit as much. The Metcalfs,a clan lessened since they joined in evensong an hour ago, would notadmit it. To the last of their strength they fought, till all werescattered save a few of them.

  Down the rough lane past Wilstrop Wood--a lane pitted deep withruts--the Royalists fled headlong. And at the far side of the wood,where the lane bent round to a trim farmstead, there was a piteoushappening. A child, standing at the gate in wonderment at all theuproar and the shouting, saw a press of gentry come riding hard, andbegan to open the gate for them, bobbing a curtsey as the first horsemanpassed. He did not see her. Those behind did not see her, but,pressing forward roughly--pressed in turn by those behind--the weight ofthem was thrust forward and broke down the gate.

  After their passing a woman came from the farmsteading, eager to go outand see how it had fared with her husband, a volunteer for Rupert.Under the broken gate she found a little, trampled body; and all herheart grew stony.

  "Lord God," she said, "Thou knows't men make the battles, but the womenpay for them."

  On Marston Moor the Squire of Nappa had found his coolness return whenit was needed most. The Prince, and he, and Christopher, their horseskilled under them long since, had just won free of a hot skirmish at therear of their retreating friends, and were left in a quiet backwater ofthe pursuit.

  "Best get away," he said. "You're needed to see to the aftermath ofthis red harvest."

  His sturdy common sense had struck the true note. Rupert had had inmind to die fighting, since all else was lost. And now the little,fluting note of trust came to him through the havoc. He was needed.

  They came, these three, to the clayey lands--wet and sticky to thefeet--that bordered Wilstrop Wood. The storm, tired of its fury, hadrent the clouds apart with a last soaking deluge, and the moon shonehigh, tender as a Madonna yearning to bring peace on earth.

  A fresh pursuit came near them, and they turned into a field offlowering beans on their left. They heard the pursuit go by. Then theyheard a litany of pain come out from Wilstrop Wood, where woundedCavaliers had taken refuge. And from Marston Moor there was theceaseless crying--not good to hear--of horses that would never again, inthis world, at least, find the stride of a gallop over open fields.

  To these three, hidden in the bean-field, came an odd detachment fromthe pity and the uproar of it all. Nothing seemed to matter, exceptsleep. The heat, and rain, and burden of that bitter hour just endedwere no more than nightmares, ended by this ease of mind and body thatwas stealing over them. It was good to be alive, if only to enjoy thispleasant languor.

  The Squire of Nappa laughed sharply as he got to his feet. "At my age,to go sleeping in a field of flowering beans! As well lie bed-fellowwith poppies. D'ye guess what I dreamed just now? Why, that I wascrowned King in London, with Noll Cromwell, dressed as Venus, doinghomage to me."

  "Ah, don't rouse me, father," grumbled Kit. "I'm smelling a Yoredalebyre again, and hear the snod kine rattling at their chains."

  But Rupert, when at last he, too, was roused, said nothing of his dream.It had been built of moons and Stardust--made up of all the matters hehad lost in this queer life of prose--and he would share it with no man.

  When they got to the pastures again--blundering as men in drink mightdo--the free, light air that follows thunder blew about their wits. Itwas Rupert who first spoke. He remembered that men in flight weretrusting him, were needing a leader.

  "Friends," he said, "I'm for York. Do you go with me?"

  The noise from Wilstrop Wood, the cries from the Moor, grew small in thehearing as they made their way to a speck of light that showed ahalf-mile or so in front. Two farm-dogs sprang out on them when theyreached the farmstead; but the fugitives knew the way of such, andpassed unhindered.

  "Are ye fro' Marston, gentles?" asked the farmer, limping out to learnwhat the uproar was about. "Ay? Then how has the King sped?"

  "We are broken," said Rupert simply.

  "Well, I'm sorry. Step in and shelter. Ye'd be the better for a meal,by the look o' ye. 'Tis the least I can do for His Majesty, seeing mytwo rheumy legs kept me fro' riding to his help."

  "Have you three horses we can borrow, friend?"

  "Nay, I've but two. You're welcome to them; and they're sound-footed,which is more than their master can say of himself."

  While they snatched a meal of beef and bread, Christopher glanced at thePrince. "I know my way on foot to Ripley, and they may need me there,"he said.

  "The fields will be packed with danger, lad. Run at my stirrup, till bygood luck we find a third horse on the road to York."

  "Let him be," growled the old Squire. "There's a lady lives at Ripley.Lovers and drunkards seldom come to harm, they say."

  "Ah, so!" For a moment there was a glow of tenderness in Rupert'ssombre eyes. "It is good to hear the name of lady after the latehappenings. Get forward, sir, and guard her."

  Christopher saw them get to horse and take the track that led to York.Then he fared out into the moonlit pastures, took his bearings, andheaded straight for Ripley. The distance was less than twelve miles bythe field-tracks; but, by the route he took, it was slow to follow. Theclay-lands were waterlogged by the late storm; the hedges to be brokenthrough were high and thorny; but these were not the greatest of histroubles. It had been no velvet warfare, that hour's fight on the Moor.Constantly, as Kit went forward, he heard a groan from the right hand orthe left, and stayed to tend a wounded comrade. There was peril, too,from horses roaming, maddened and riderless, in search of the mastersthey had lost.

  The first two miles were purgatory, because Kit's heart was young, andfiery, and tender, because he felt the sufferings of the wounded as hisown. The flight, on this side of the Moor, went no further; and for therest of the journey he had only trouble of the going to encounter. Hecame late to Ripley Castle; and the sentry who answered to his knockingon the gate opened guardedly.

  "Who goes?" he asked.

  "Christopher Metcalf, sick with thirst and hunger."

  The door was thrown open suddenly. In the ill-lighted hall he saw BenWaddilove, the old manservant of the Grants, who had ridden--long since,when last year's corn was yellowing to harvest--in charge of MistressJoan.

  Marston Moor was forgotten. The troubles of the day and night wereforgotten, as sunlight dries the rain. Kit was a lover. "How is themistress, Ben?" he asked.

  "Oh, her temper's keen and trim. Mistress Grant ails naught. I supposeMarston's lost and won? Well, it had to be, I reckon. Who brought thenews to Ripley, think ye?"

  "I couldn't guess, you old fool."

  "Oh, may be old--but not so much of a fool, maybe. He's in yonder,closeted wi' Lady Ingilby in the parlour. I kenned him at first sightby the lap of his ugly jaw. Come hitherto on the tips of your toes,Master Christopher."

  The parlour door stood open, and within Kit saw a scene of such amazingoddity that he did not know whether he watched tragedy or comedy in thedoing. The hearth was red with crackling logs. At the far end of thetable sat Lady Ingilby, a cocked pistol lying close to her right hand;seated opposite her was a thick bulk of a man, with a rusty bandage tiedround his neck; between them were four candles, burning with a tranquilflame.

  "So you come, Mr. Cromwell, to quarter yourself here?" Lady Ingilby wassaving.

  "I do, madam."

  "You come alone, knowing we are a house of women and of wounded men?Oh, the courage of you! And even our wounded have left us--not one ofthem so crippled but the news of Rupert's coming spurred him on toMarston."

  "The news of Rupert's going will comfort them, maybe," growled Cromwell.

  "He thrashed you handsomel
y. Oh, we have the news! First, a runnercame, telling how Lord Fairfax and the leader of the Ironsides had leftthe field."

  Cromwell's quick temper took fire. "You claim a woman's privilege----

  "No, my pistol's. We talk as man to man. I say that we have the news.And then a second runner came and told us Leslie's Scots had won thebattle. And we sorrowed, but not as if it had been you who claimed thevictory."

  The man was dead weary; but her scorn, quiet and assured, roused him."Am I so hated, then, by your side of this quarrel?"

  "Hated? That is a little word."

  "Good! Any wayside fool can be loved--it takes a man to earn hatred."

  "A man of sorts--granted. You will tell me, Mr. Cromwell, what yourpurpose was in coming to this house. My husband may be lying dead onMarston Field. Perhaps you came, in courtesy, to distract my grief."

  "I came because Lord Fairfax bade me," said Cromwell bluntly. "We haveno courtesy in Rutland, as you know. Mere folly must have bidden meleave my men outside, lest they intruded on you over-roughly."

  "How many of them did Rupert leave you for a guard?" She was aware ofan unexpected courtesy in the man's voice. It seemed no more thansmooth hypocrisy.

  "A few within call. They are not gentle."

  "Nor I. As man to man--I stand for the husband who may return or maynot--we are here, we two. You have a body of surprising strength, butit is I who hold the pistol. Believe me, Mr. Cromwell, I have learnedyour proverb well; I trust in Providence and keep my powder dry."

  Christopher, watching them from the dusk of the passage, turned away.It did not seem that Lady Ingilby needed him. Yet he turned for a lastglance--saw Cromwell's head fall prone on his hands. Weariness hadcaptured him at length. The mistress of Ripley sat with uprightcarriage, seeing dream-pictures in the glowing fire of logs; and somewere nightmares, but a silver thread ran through them--the knowledgethat, whether he lived or lay dead, she had her husband's love.

  "She bested him, and proper," chuckled Ben Waddilove. "When he came in,he looked like a man who might well go to sleep for good and all. We'llhope as much--and I was ever a prayerful man, as men go."

  At the turn of the passage, where a lamp was smoking evilly, Kit saw aghost come with unsteady step to meet him--a comely ghost, in white,fleecy draperies, a ghost that carried a sputtering candle. AfterMarston, and the carnage, and the desolate, long journey from the Moorto Ripley here, Christopher was ripe to fancy all beauty an illusion.It was only when he saw the red-brown hair, falling disordered about thewhiteness of her gown, that his eyes grew clear.

  "So you have come?" asked Joan Grant. "I did not summon you."

  "Is that true, Joan?"

  She would not meet his glance. "Why should I summon you?"

  "Oh, that's for you to know. As we lay in the bean-field--the Prince,and father and I--you came and whispered."

  "I travelled far, then, and must have galloped home at speed."

  Old Waddilove, who knew his world, moved down the passage noisily. "Formy part," he said, talking to himself, and thinking he only murmured, "Iallus said like mun wed like, choose what pranks come between. They'refratching already, and that's a good sign. A varry good sign. Therewas niver two folks fit for wedlock till they've learned how to fratch.It clears their heads o' whimsies."

  The draughty passage seemed full of Ben's philosophy. They could hearnothing else, except the steady swish of thunder-rain outside. And Joanlaughed, because she could not help it.

  There was no concealment then. Laughter opens more doors than the highgravity that lover-folk affect.

  "My dear, you know that you came," said Kit.

  "I know that I lay awake, sick with terror for you. I saw youfighting--oh, so gallantly--saw Rupert steal, a broken man, into a fieldof flowering beans, with only the Squire and you to guard him. And thenI fell asleep--as if the bean-scent had stifled me, too--and Idreamed----"

  "Well, Joan?"

  "That you were hindered, somehow. That you came to great honour andforgot me."

  "And that troubled you?" said Kit adroitly.

  "Oh, till I woke! Then it seemed to matter little. My heart sits on thetop of a high tree, Master Christopher, as I told you long ago."

  All that he had fancied in the gaining seemed lost, all that thesuffering and long anxiety of war had taught him. She was dainty,elusive, provocative, just as she had been in Yoredale, before herbaptism of fire.

  "Then why were you sick with terror for me?" he asked, as ifdownrightness served as well with women as with men.

  "Why? Because, perhaps, it is rather cold in the tree-tops, and a heartcomes down now and then for a little warmth. I shall bid yougood-night, sir. You're in need of rest, I think."

  "Joan," he said, "I love you very well."

  She halted a moment. The light from her candle showed Kit a face madeup of spring-time in a northern lane. Long battle, long abstention froma glimpse of her, brought the old love racing back at flood. And yet itwas a new love, deepened and widened by the knowledge gained between theriding out from Yoredale and the stark misery of Marston Moor.

  "You will let me go," she said at last. "Is it a time for ease ofheart, when our men are dead, or dying, or in flight? They have told mehow it sped at Marston--and, Kit, what of the King, when the news goesspurring south to him?"

  What of the King? Their own needs--for one caress, one taste ofhappiness amid the rout--went by. Their loyalty was not a thing ofyesterday; its roots lay thick and thrifty in soil centuries old.

  "God forgive me," said Christopher. "I had forgotten the King."