"I will eat nothing at the hands that slew my kinsman," she replied.

"Dear madam," Dick cried, "I swear to you upon the rood I touched him
not."

"Swear to me that he still lives," she returned.

"I will not palter with you," answered Dick.  "Pity bids me to wound you.
In my heart I do believe him dead."

"And ye ask me to eat!" she cried.  "Ay, and they call you 'sir!'  Y'
have won your spurs by my good kinsman's murder.  And had I not been fool
and traitor both, and saved you in your enemy's house, ye should have
died the death, and he--he that was worth twelve of you--were living."

"I did but my man's best, even as your kinsman did upon the other party,"
answered Dick.  "Were he still living--as I vow to Heaven I wish it!--he
would praise, not blame me."

"Sir Daniel hath told me," she replied.  "He marked you at the barricade.
Upon you, he saith, their party foundered; it was you that won the
battle.  Well, then, it was you that killed my good Lord Risingham, as
sure as though ye had strangled him.  And ye would have me eat with
you--and your hands not washed from killing?  But Sir Daniel hath sworn
your downfall.  He 'tis that will avenge me!"

The unfortunate Dick was plunged in gloom.  Old Arblaster returned upon
his mind, and he groaned aloud.

"Do ye hold me so guilty?" he said; "you that defended me--you that are
Joanna's friend?"

"What made ye in the battle?" she retorted.  "Y' are of no party; y' are
but a lad--but legs and body, without government of wit or counsel!
Wherefore did ye fight?  For the love of hurt, pardy!"

"Nay," cried Dick, "I know not.  But as the realm of England goes, if
that a poor gentleman fight not upon the one side, perforce he must fight
upon the other.  He may not stand alone; 'tis not in nature."

"They that have no judgment should not draw the sword," replied the young
lady.  "Ye that fight but for a hazard, what are ye but a butcher?  War
is but noble by the cause, and y' have disgraced it."

"Madam," said the miserable Dick, "I do partly see mine error.  I have
made too much haste; I have been busy before my time.  Already I stole a
ship--thinking, I do swear it, to do well--and thereby brought about the
death of many innocent, and the grief and ruin of a poor old man whose
face this very day hath stabbed me like a dagger.  And for this morning,
I did but design to do myself credit, and get fame to marry with, and,
behold! I have brought about the death of your dear kinsman that was good
to me.  And what besides, I know not.  For, alas! I may have set York
upon the throne, and that may be the worser cause, and may do hurt to
England.  O, madam, I do see my sin.  I am unfit for life.  I will, for
penance sake and to avoid worse evil, once I have finished this
adventure, get me to a cloister.  I will forswear Joanna and the trade of
arms.  I will be a friar, and pray for your good kinsman's spirit all my
days."

It appeared to Dick, in this extremity of his humiliation and repentance,
that the young lady had laughed.

Raising his countenance, he found her looking down upon him, in the
fire-light, with a somewhat peculiar but not unkind expression.

"Madam," he cried, thinking the laughter to have been an illusion of his
hearing, but still, from her changed looks, hoping to have touched her
heart, "madam, will not this content you?  I give up all to undo what I
have done amiss; I make heaven certain for Lord Risingham.  And all this
upon the very day that I have won my spurs, and thought myself the
happiest young gentleman on ground."

"O boy," she said--"good boy!"

And then, to the extreme surprise of Dick, she first very tenderly wiped
the tears away from his cheeks, and then, as if yielding to a sudden
impulse, threw both her arms about his neck, drew up his face, and kissed
him.  A pitiful bewilderment came over simple-minded Dick.

"But come," she said, with great cheerfulness, "you that are a captain,
ye must eat.  Why sup ye not?"

"Dear Mistress Risingham," replied Dick, "I did but wait first upon my
prisoner; but, to say truth, penitence will no longer suffer me to endure
the sight of food.  I were better to fast, dear lady, and to pray."

"Call me Alicia," she said; "are we not old friends?  And now, come, I
will eat with you, bit for bit and sup for sup; so if ye eat not, neither
will I; but if ye eat hearty, I will dine like a ploughman."

So there and then she fell to; and Dick, who had an excellent stomach,
proceeded to bear her company, at first with great reluctance, but
gradually, as he entered into the spirit, with more and more vigour and
devotion: until, at last, he forgot even to watch his model, and most
heartily repaired the expenses of his day of labour and excitement.

"Lion-driver," she said, at length, "ye do not admire a maid in a man's
jerkin?"

The moon was now up; and they were only waiting to repose the wearied
horses.  By the moon's light, the still penitent but now well-fed Richard
beheld her looking somewhat coquettishly down upon him.

"Madam"--he stammered, surprised at this new turn in her manners.

"Nay," she interrupted, "it skills not to deny; Joanna hath told me, but
come, Sir Lion-driver, look at me--am I so homely--come!"

And she made bright eyes at him.

"Ye are something smallish, indeed"--began Dick.

And here again she interrupted him, this time with a ringing peal of
laughter that completed his confusion and surprise.

"Smallish!" she cried.  "Nay, now, be honest as ye are bold; I am a
dwarf, or little better; but for all that--come, tell me!--for all that,
passably fair to look upon; is't not so?"

"Nay, madam, exceedingly fair," said the distressed knight, pitifully
trying to seem easy.

"And a man would be right glad to wed me?" she pursued.

"O, madam, right glad!" agreed Dick.

"Call me Alicia," said she.

"Alicia," quoth Sir Richard.

"Well, then, lion-driver," she continued, "sith that ye slew my kinsman,
and left me without stay, ye owe me, in honour, every reparation; do ye
not?"

"I do, madam," said Dick.  "Although, upon my heart, I do hold me but
partially guilty of that brave knight's blood."

"Would ye evade me?" she cried.

"Madam, not so.  I have told you; at your bidding, I will even turn me a
monk," said Richard.

"Then, in honour, ye belong to me?" she concluded.

"In honour, madam, I suppose"--began the young man.

"Go to!" she interrupted; "ye are too full of catches.  In honour do ye
belong to me, till ye have paid the evil?"

"In honour, I do," said Dick.

"Hear, then," she continued; "Ye would make but a sad friar, methinks;
and since I am to dispose of you at pleasure, I will even take you for my
husband.  Nay, now, no words!" cried she.  "They will avail you nothing.
For see how just it is, that you who deprived me of one home, should
supply me with another.  And as for Joanna, she will be the first,
believe me, to commend the change; for, after all, as we be dear friends,
what matters it with which of us ye wed?  Not one whit!"

"Madam," said Dick, "I will go into a cloister, an ye please to bid me;
but to wed with anyone in this big world besides Joanna Sedley is what I
will consent to neither for man's force nor yet for lady's pleasure.
Pardon me if I speak my plain thoughts plainly; but where a maid is very
bold, a poor man must even be the bolder."

"Dick," she said, "ye sweet boy, ye must come and kiss me for that word.
Nay, fear not, ye shall kiss me for Joanna; and when we meet, I shall
give it back to her, and say I stole it.  And as for what ye owe me, why,
dear simpleton, methinks ye were not alone in that great battle; and even
if York be on the throne, it was not you that set him there.  But for a
good, sweet, honest heart, Dick, y' are all that; and if I could find it
in my soul to envy your Joanna anything, I would even envy her your
love."



CHAPTER VI--NIGHT IN THE WOODS (concluded): DICK AND JOAN


The horses had by this time finished the small store of provender, and
fully breathed from their fatigues.  At Dick's command, the fire was
smothered in snow; and while his men got once more wearily to saddle, he
himself, remembering, somewhat late, true woodland caution, chose a tall
oak and nimbly clambered to the topmost fork.  Hence he could look far
abroad on the moonlit and snow-paven forest.  On the south-west, dark
against the horizon, stood those upland, heathy quarters where he and
Joanna had met with the terrifying misadventure of the leper.  And there
his eye was caught by a spot of ruddy brightness no bigger than a
needle's eye.

He blamed himself sharply for his previous neglect.  Were that, as it
appeared to be, the shining of Sir Daniel's camp-fire, he should long ago
have seen and marched for it; above all, he should, for no consideration,
have announced his neighbourhood by lighting a fire of his own.  But now
he must no longer squander valuable hours.  The direct way to the uplands
was about two miles in length; but it was crossed by a very deep,
precipitous dingle, impassable to mounted men; and for the sake of speed,
it seemed to Dick advisable to desert the horses and attempt the
adventure on foot.

Ten men were left to guard the horses; signals were agreed upon by which
they could communicate in case of need; and Dick set forth at the head of
the remainder, Alicia Risingham walking stoutly by his side.

The men had freed themselves of heavy armour, and left behind their
lances; and they now marched with a very good spirit in the frozen snow,
and under the exhilarating lustre of the moon.  The descent into the
dingle, where a stream strained sobbing through the snow and ice, was
effected with silence and order; and on the further side, being then
within a short half mile of where Dick had seen the glimmer of the fire,
the party halted to breathe before the attack.

In the vast silence of the wood, the lightest sounds were audible from
far; and Alicia, who was keen of hearing, held up her finger warningly
and stooped to listen.  All followed her example; but besides the groans
of the choked brook in the dingle close behind, and the barking of a fox
at a distance of many miles among the forest, to Dick's acutest
hearkening, not a breath was audible.

"But yet, for sure, I heard the clash of harness," whispered Alicia.

"Madam," returned Dick, who was more afraid of that young lady than of
ten stout warriors, "I would not hint ye were mistaken; but it might well
have come from either of the camps."

"It came not thence.  It came from westward," she declared.

"It may be what it will," returned Dick; "and it must be as heaven
please.  Reck we not a jot, but push on the livelier, and put it to the
touch.  Up, friends--enough breathed."

As they advanced, the snow became more and more trampled with hoof-marks,
and it was plain that they were drawing near to the encampment of a
considerable force of mounted men.  Presently they could see the smoke
pouring from among the trees, ruddily coloured on its lower edge and
scattering bright sparks.

And here, pursuant to Dick's orders, his men began to open out, creeping
stealthily in the covert, to surround on every side the camp of their
opponents.  He himself, placing Alicia in the shelter of a bulky oak,
stole straight forth in the direction of the fire.

At last, through an opening of the wood, his eye embraced the scene of
the encampment.  The fire had been built upon a heathy hummock of the
ground, surrounded on three sides by thicket, and it now burned very
strong, roaring aloud and brandishing flames.  Around it there sat not
quite a dozen people, warmly cloaked; but though the neighbouring snow
was trampled down as by a regiment, Dick looked in vain for any horse.
He began to have a terrible misgiving that he was out-manoeuvred.  At the
same time, in a tall man with a steel salet, who was spreading his hands
before the blaze, he recognised his old friend and still kindly enemy,
Bennet Hatch; and in two others, sitting a little back, he made out, even
in their male disguise, Joanna Sedley and Sir Daniel's wife.

"Well," thought he to himself, "even if I lose my horses, let me get my
Joanna, and why should I complain?"

And then, from the further side of the encampment, there came a little
whistle, announcing that his men had joined, and the investment was
complete.

Bennet, at the sound, started to his feet; but ere he had time to spring
upon his arms, Dick hailed him.

"Bennet," he said--"Bennet, old friend, yield ye.  Ye will but spill
men's lives in vain, if ye resist."

"'Tis Master Shelton, by St. Barbary!" cried Hatch.  "Yield me?  Ye ask
much.  What force have ye?"

"I tell you, Bennet, ye are both outnumbered and begirt," said Dick.
"Caesar and Charlemagne would cry for quarter.  I have two score men at
my whistle, and with one shoot of arrows I could answer for you all."

"Master Dick," said Bennet, "it goes against my heart; but I must do my
duty.  The saints help you!"  And therewith he raised a little tucket to
his mouth and wound a rousing call.

Then followed a moment of confusion; for while Dick, fearing for the
ladies, still hesitated to give the word to shoot, Hatch's little band
sprang to their weapons and formed back to back as for a fierce
resistance.  In the hurry of their change of place, Joanna sprang from
her seat and ran like an arrow to her lover's side.

"Here, Dick!" she cried, as she clasped his hand in hers.

But Dick still stood irresolute; he was yet young to the more deplorable
necessities of war, and the thought of old Lady Brackley checked the
command upon his tongue.  His own men became restive.  Some of them cried
on him by name; others, of their own accord, began to shoot; and at the
first discharge poor Bennet bit the dust.  Then Dick awoke.

"On!" he cried.  "Shoot, boys, and keep to cover.  England and York!"

But just then the dull beat of many horses on the snow suddenly arose in
the hollow ear of the night, and, with incredible swiftness, drew nearer
and swelled louder.  At the same time, answering tuckets repeated and
repeated Hatch's call.

"Rally, rally!" cried Dick.  "Rally upon me!  Rally for your lives!"

But his men--afoot, scattered, taken in the hour when they had counted on
an easy triumph--began instead to give ground severally, and either stood
wavering or dispersed into the thickets.  And when the first of the
horsemen came charging through the open avenues and fiercely riding their
steeds into the underwood, a few stragglers were overthrown or speared
among the brush, but the bulk of Dick's command had simply melted at the
rumour of their coming.

Dick stood for a moment, bitterly recognising the fruits of his
precipitate and unwise valour.  Sir Daniel had seen the fire; he had
moved out with his main force, whether to attack his pursuers or to take
them in the rear if they should venture the assault.  His had been
throughout the part of a sagacious captain; Dick's the conduct of an
eager boy.  And here was the young knight, his sweetheart, indeed,
holding him tightly by the hand, but otherwise alone, his whole command
of men and horses dispersed in the night and the wide forest, like a
paper of pins in a bay barn.

"The saints enlighten me!" he thought.  "It is well I was knighted for
this morning's matter; this doth me little honour."

And thereupon, still holding Joanna, he began to run.

The silence of the night was now shattered by the shouts of the men of
Tunstall, as they galloped hither and thither, hunting fugitives; and
Dick broke boldly through the underwood and ran straight before him like
a deer.  The silver clearness of the moon upon the open snow increased,
by contrast, the obscurity of the thickets; and the extreme dispersion of
the vanquished led the pursuers into wildly divergent paths.  Hence, in
but a little while, Dick and Joanna paused, in a close covert, and heard
the sounds of the pursuit, scattering abroad, indeed, in all directions,
but yet fainting already in the distance.

"An I had but kept a reserve of them together," Dick cried, bitterly, "I
could have turned the tables yet!  Well, we live and learn; next time it
shall go better, by the rood."

"Nay, Dick," said Joanna, "what matters it?  Here we are together once
again."

He looked at her, and there she was--John Matcham, as of yore, in hose
and doublet.  But now he knew her; now, even in that ungainly dress, she
smiled upon him, bright with love; and his heart was transported with
joy.

"Sweetheart," he said, "if ye forgive this blunderer, what care I?  Make
we direct for Holywood; there lieth your good guardian and my better
friend, Lord Foxham.  There shall we be wed; and whether poor or wealthy,
famous or unknown, what, matters it?  This day, dear love, I won my
spurs; I was commended by great men for my valour; I thought myself the
goodliest man of war in all broad England.  Then, first, I fell out of my
favour with the great; and now have I been well thrashed, and clean lost
my soldiers.  There was a downfall for conceit!  But, dear, I care
not--dear, if ye still love me and will wed, I would have my knighthood
done away, and mind it not a jot."

"My Dick!" she cried.  "And did they knight you?"

"Ay, dear, ye are my lady now," he answered, fondly; "or ye shall, ere
noon to-morrow--will ye not?"

"That will I, Dick, with a glad heart," she answered.

"Ay, sir?  Methought ye were to be a monk!" said a voice in their ears.

"Alicia!" cried Joanna.

"Even so," replied the young lady, coming forward.  "Alicia, whom ye left
for dead, and whom your lion-driver found, and brought to life again,
and, by my sooth, made love to, if ye want to know!"

"I'll not believe it," cried Joanna.  "Dick!"

"Dick!" mimicked Alicia.  "Dick, indeed!  Ay, fair sir, and ye desert
poor damsels in distress," she continued, turning to the young knight.
"Ye leave them planted behind oaks.  But they say true--the age of
chivalry is dead."

"Madam," cried Dick, in despair, "upon my soul I had forgotten you
outright.  Madam, ye must try to pardon me.  Ye see, I had new found
Joanna!"

"I did not suppose that ye had done it o' purpose," she retorted.  "But I
will be cruelly avenged.  I will tell a secret to my Lady Shelton--she
that is to be," she added, curtseying.  "Joanna," she continued, "I
believe, upon my soul, your sweetheart is a bold fellow in a fight, but
he is, let me tell you plainly, the softest-hearted simpleton in England.
Go to--ye may do your pleasure with him!  And now, fool children, first
kiss me, either one of you, for luck and kindness; and then kiss each
other just one minute by the glass, and not one second longer; and then
let us all three set forth for Holywood as fast as we can stir; for these
woods, methinks, are full of peril and exceeding cold."

"But did my Dick make love to you?" asked Joanna, clinging to her
sweetheart's side.

"Nay, fool girl," returned Alicia; "it was I made love to him.  I offered
to marry him, indeed; but he bade me go marry with my likes.  These were
his words.  Nay, that I will say: he is more plain than pleasant.  But
now, children, for the sake of sense, set forward.  Shall we go once more
over the dingle, or push straight for Holywood?"

"Why," said Dick, "I would like dearly to get upon a horse; for I have
been sore mauled and beaten, one way and another, these last days, and my
poor body is one bruise.  But how think ye?  If the men, upon the alarm
of the fighting, had fled away, we should have gone about for nothing.
'Tis but some three short miles to Holywood direct; the bell hath not
beat nine; the snow is pretty firm to walk upon, the moon clear; how if
we went even as we are?"

"Agreed," cried Alicia; but Joanna only pressed upon Dick's arm.

Forth, then, they went, through open leafless groves and down snow-clad
alleys, under the white face of the winter moon; Dick and Joanna walking
hand in hand and in a heaven of pleasure; and their light-minded
companion, her own bereavements heartily forgotten, followed a pace or
two behind, now rallying them upon their silence, and now drawing happy
pictures of their future and united lives.

Still, indeed, in the distance of the wood, the riders of Tunstall might
be heard urging their pursuit; and from time to time cries or the clash
of steel announced the shock of enemies.  But in these young folk, bred
among the alarms of war, and fresh from such a multiplicity of dangers,
neither fear nor pity could be lightly wakened.  Content to find the
sounds still drawing farther and farther away, they gave up their hearts
to the enjoyment of the hour, walking already, as Alicia put it, in a
wedding procession; and neither the rude solitude of the forest, nor the
cold of the freezing night, had any force to shadow or distract their
happiness.

At length, from a rising hill, they looked below them on the dell of
Holywood.  The great windows of the forest abbey shone with torch and
candle; its high pinnacles and spires arose very clear and silent, and
the gold rood upon the topmost summit glittered brightly in the moon.
All about it, in the open glade, camp-fires were burning, and the ground
was thick with huts; and across the midst of the picture the frozen river
curved.

"By the mass," said Richard, "there are Lord Foxham's fellows still
encamped.  The messenger hath certainly miscarried.  Well, then, so
better.  We have power at hand to face Sir Daniel."

But if Lord Foxham's men still lay encamped in the long holm at Holywood,
it was from a different reason from the one supposed by Dick.  They had
marched, indeed, for Shoreby; but ere they were half way thither, a
second messenger met them, and bade them return to their morning's camp,
to bar the road against Lancastrian fugitives, and to be so much nearer
to the main army of York.  For Richard of Gloucester, having finished the
battle and stamped out his foes in that district, was already on the
march to rejoin his brother; and not long after the return of my Lord
Foxham's retainers, Crookback himself drew rein before the abbey door.
It was in honour of this august visitor that the windows shone with
lights; and at the hour of Dick's arrival with his sweetheart and her
friend, the whole ducal party was being entertained in the refectory with
the splendour of that powerful and luxurious monastery.

Dick, not quite with his good will, was brought before them.  Gloucester,
sick with fatigue, sat leaning upon one hand his white and terrifying
countenance; Lord Foxham, half recovered from his wound, was in a place
of honour on his left.

"How, sir?" asked Richard.  "Have ye brought me Sir Daniel's head?"

"My lord duke," replied Dick, stoutly enough, but with a qualm at heart,
"I have not even the good fortune to return with my command.  I have
been, so please your grace, well beaten."

Gloucester looked upon him with a formidable frown.

"I gave you fifty lances, {3} sir," he said.

"My lord duke, I had but fifty men-at-arms," replied the young knight.

"How is this?" said Gloucester.  "He did ask me fifty lances."

"May it please your grace," replied Catesby, smoothly, "for a pursuit we
gave him but the horsemen."

"It is well," replied Richard, adding, "Shelton, ye may go."

"Stay!" said Lord Foxham.  "This young man likewise had a charge from me.
It may be he hath better sped.  Say, Master Shelton, have ye found the
maid?"

"I praise the saints, my lord," said Dick, "she is in this house."

"Is it even so?  Well, then, my lord the duke," resumed Lord Foxham,
"with your good will, to-morrow, before the army march, I do propose a
marriage.  This young squire--"

"Young knight," interrupted Catesby.

"Say ye so, Sir William?" cried Lord Foxham.

"I did myself, and for good service, dub him knight," said Gloucester.
"He hath twice manfully served me.  It is not valour of hands, it is a
man's mind of iron, that he lacks.  He will not rise, Lord Foxham.  'Tis
a fellow that will fight indeed bravely in a mellay, but hath a capon's
heart.  Howbeit, if he is to marry, marry him in the name of Mary, and be
done!"

"Nay, he is a brave lad--I know it," said Lord Foxham.  "Content ye,
then, Sir Richard.  I have compounded this affair with Master Hamley, and
to-morrow ye shall wed."

Whereupon Dick judged it prudent to withdraw; but he was not yet clear of
the refectory, when a man, but newly alighted at the gate, came running
four stairs at a bound, and, brushing through the abbey servants, threw
himself on one knee before the duke.

"Victory, my lord," he cried.

And before Dick had got to the chamber set apart for him as Lord Foxham's
guest, the troops in the holm were cheering around their fires; for upon
that same day, not twenty miles away, a second crushing blow had been
dealt to the power of Lancaster.



CHAPTER VII--DICK'S REVENGE


The next morning Dick was afoot before the sun, and having dressed
himself to the best advantage with the aid of the Lord Foxham's baggage,
and got good reports of Joan, he set forth on foot to walk away his
impatience.

For some while he made rounds among the soldiery, who were getting to
arms in the wintry twilight of the dawn and by the red glow of torches;
but gradually he strolled further afield, and at length passed clean
beyond the outposts, and walked alone in the frozen forest, waiting for
the sun.

His thoughts were both quiet and happy.  His brief favour with the Duke
he could not find it in his heart to mourn; with Joan to wife, and my
Lord Foxham for a faithful patron, he looked most happily upon the
future; and in the past he found but little to regret.

As he thus strolled and pondered, the solemn light of the morning grew
more clear, the east was already coloured by the sun, and a little
scathing wind blew up the frozen snow.  He turned to go home; but even as
he turned, his eye lit upon a figure behind, a tree.

"Stand!" he cried.  "Who goes?"

The figure stepped forth and waved its hand like a dumb person.  It was
arrayed like a pilgrim, the hood lowered over the face, but Dick, in an
instant, recognised Sir Daniel.

He strode up to him, drawing his sword; and the knight, putting his hand
in his bosom, as if to seize a hidden weapon, steadfastly awaited his
approach.

"Well, Dickon," said Sir Daniel, "how is it to be?  Do ye make war upon
the fallen?"

"I made no war upon your life," replied the lad; "I was your true friend
until ye sought for mine; but ye have sought for it greedily."

"Nay--self-defence," replied the knight.  "And now, boy, the news of this
battle, and the presence of yon crooked devil here in mine own wood, have
broken me beyond all help.  I go to Holywood for sanctuary; thence
overseas, with what I can carry, and to begin life again in Burgundy or
France."

"Ye may not go to Holywood," said Dick.

"How!  May not?" asked the knight.

"Look ye, Sir Daniel, this is my marriage morn," said Dick; "and yon sun
that is to rise will make the brightest day that ever shone for me.  Your
life is forfeit--doubly forfeit, for my father's death and your own
practices to meward.  But I myself have done amiss; I have brought about
men's deaths; and upon this glad day I will be neither judge nor hangman.
An ye were the devil, I would not lay a hand on you.  An ye were the
devil, ye might go where ye will for me.  Seek God's forgiveness; mine ye
have freely.  But to go on to Holywood is different.  I carry arms for
York, and I will suffer no spy within their lines.  Hold it, then, for
certain, if ye set one foot before another, I will uplift my voice and
call the nearest post to seize you."

"Ye mock me," said Sir Daniel.  "I have no safety out of Holywood."

"I care no more," returned Richard.  "I let you go east, west, or south;
north I will not.  Holywood is shut against you.  Go, and seek not to
return.  For, once ye are gone, I will warn every post about this army,
and there will be so shrewd a watch upon all pilgrims that, once again,
were ye the very devil, ye would find it ruin to make the essay."

"Ye doom me," said Sir Daniel, gloomily.

"I doom you not," returned Richard.  "If it so please you to set your
valour against mine, come on; and though I fear it be disloyal to my
party, I will take the challenge openly and fully, fight you with mine
own single strength, and call for none to help me.  So shall I avenge my
father, with a perfect conscience."

"Ay," said Sir Daniel, "y' have a long sword against my dagger."

"I rely upon Heaven only," answered Dick, casting his sword some way
behind him on the snow.  "Now, if your ill-fate bids you, come; and,
under the pleasure of the Almighty, I make myself bold to feed your bones
to foxes."

"I did but try you, Dickon," returned the knight, with an uneasy
semblance of a laugh.  "I would not spill your blood."

"Go, then, ere it be too late," replied Shelton.  "In five minutes I will
call the post.  I do perceive that I am too long-suffering.  Had but our
places been reversed, I should have been bound hand and foot some minutes
past."

"Well, Dickon, I will go," replied Sir Daniel.  "When we next meet, it
shall repent you that ye were so harsh."

And with these words, the knight turned and began to move off under the
trees.  Dick watched him with strangely-mingled feelings, as he went,
swiftly and warily, and ever and again turning a wicked eye upon the lad
who had spared him, and whom he still suspected.

There was upon one side of where he went a thicket, strongly matted with
green ivy, and, even in its winter state, impervious to the eye.  Herein,
all of a sudden, a bow sounded like a note of music.  An arrow flew, and
with a great, choked cry of agony and anger, the Knight of Tunstall threw
up his hands and fell forward in the snow.

Dick bounded to his side and raised him.  His face desperately worked;
his whole body was shaken by contorting spasms.

"Is the arrow black?" he gasped.

"It is black," replied Dick, gravely.

And then, before he could add one word, a desperate seizure of pain shook
the wounded man from head to foot, so that his body leaped in Dick's
supporting arms, and with the extremity of that pang his spirit fled in
silence.

The young man laid him back gently on the snow and prayed for that
unprepared and guilty spirit, and as he prayed the sun came up at a
bound, and the robins began chirping in the ivy.

When he rose to his feet, he found another man upon his knees but a few
steps behind him, and, still with uncovered head, he waited until that
prayer also should be over.  It took long; the man, with his head bowed
and his face covered with his hands, prayed like one in a great disorder
or distress of mind; and by the bow that lay beside him, Dick judged that
he was no other than the archer who had laid Sir Daniel low.

At length he, also, rose, and showed the countenance of Ellis Duckworth.

"Richard," he said, very gravely, "I heard you.  Ye took the better part
and pardoned; I took the worse, and there lies the clay of mine enemy.
Pray for me."

And he wrung him by the hand.

"Sir," said Richard, "I will pray for you, indeed; though how I may
prevail I wot not.  But if ye have so long pursued revenge, and find it
now of such a sorry flavour, bethink ye, were it not well to pardon
others?  Hatch--he is dead, poor shrew!  I would have spared a better;
and for Sir Daniel, here lies his body.  But for the priest, if I might
anywise prevail, I would have you let him go."

A flash came into the eyes of Ellis Duckworth.

"Nay," he said, "the devil is still strong within me.  But be at rest;
the Black Arrow flieth nevermore--the fellowship is broken.  They that
still live shall come to their quiet and ripe end, in Heaven's good time,
for me; and for yourself, go where your better fortune calls you, and
think no more of Ellis."



CHAPTER VIII--CONCLUSION


About nine in the morning, Lord Foxham was leading his ward, once more
dressed as befitted her sex, and followed by Alicia Risingham, to the
church of Holywood, when Richard Crookback, his brow already heavy with
cares, crossed their path and paused.

"Is this the maid?" he asked; and when Lord Foxham had replied in the
affirmative, "Minion," he added, "hold up your face until I see its
favour."

He looked upon her sourly for a little.

"Ye are fair," he said at last, "and, as they tell me, dowered.  How if I
offered you a brave marriage, as became your face and parentage?"

"My lord duke," replied Joanna, "may it please your grace, I had rather
wed with Sir Richard."

"How so?" he asked, harshly.  "Marry but the man I name to you, and he
shall be my lord, and you my lady, before night.  For Sir Richard, let me
tell you plainly, he will die Sir Richard."

"I ask no more of Heaven, my lord, than but to die Sir Richard's wife,"
returned Joanna.

"Look ye at that, my lord," said Gloucester, turning to Lord Foxham.
"Here be a pair for you.  The lad, when for good services I gave him his
choice of my favour, chose but the grace of an old, drunken shipman.  I
did warn him freely, but he was stout in his besottedness.  'Here dieth
your favour,' said I; and he, my lord, with a most assured impertinence,
'Mine be the loss,' quoth he.  It shall be so, by the rood!"

"Said he so?" cried Alicia.  "Then well said, lion-driver!"

"Who is this?" asked the duke.

"A prisoner of Sir Richard's," answered Lord Foxham; "Mistress Alicia
Risingham."

"See that she be married to a sure man," said the duke.

"I had thought of my kinsman, Hamley, an it like your grace," returned
Lord Foxham.  "He hath well served the cause."

"It likes me well," said Richard.  "Let them be wedded speedily.  Say,
fair maid, will you wed?"

"My lord duke," said Alicia, "so as the man is straight"--And there, in a
perfect consternation, the voice died on her tongue.

"He is straight, my mistress," replied Richard, calmly.  "I am the only
crookback of my party; we are else passably well shapen.  Ladies, and
you, my lord," he added, with a sudden change to grave courtesy, "judge
me not too churlish if I leave you.  A captain, in the time of war, hath
not the ordering of his hours."

And with a very handsome salutation he passed on, followed by his
officers.

"Alack," cried Alicia, "I am shent!"

"Ye know him not," replied Lord Foxham.  "It is but a trifle; he hath
already clean forgot your words."

"He is, then, the very flower of knighthood," said Alicia.

"Nay, he but mindeth other things," returned Lord Foxham.  "Tarry we no
more."

In the chancel they found Dick waiting, attended by a few young men; and
there were he and Joan united.  When they came forth again, happy and yet
serious, into the frosty air and sunlight, the long files of the army
were already winding forward up the road; already the Duke of
Gloucester's banner was unfolded and began to move from before the abbey
in a clump of spears; and behind it, girt by steel-clad knights, the
bold, black-hearted, and ambitious hunchback moved on towards his brief
kingdom and his lasting infamy.  But the wedding party turned upon the
other side, and sat down, with sober merriment, to breakfast.  The father
cellarer attended on their wants, and sat with them at table.  Hamley,
all jealousy forgotten, began to ply the nowise loth Alicia with
courtship.  And there, amid the sounding of tuckets and the clash of
armoured soldiery and horses continually moving forth, Dick and Joan sat
side by side, tenderly held hands, and looked, with ever growing
affection, in each other's eyes.

Thenceforth the dust and blood of that unruly epoch passed them by.  They
dwelt apart from alarms in the green forest where their love began.

Two old men in the meanwhile enjoyed pensions in great prosperity and
peace, and with perhaps a superfluity of ale and wine, in Tunstall
hamlet.  One had been all his life a shipman, and continued to the last
to lament his man Tom.  The other, who had been a bit of everything,
turned in the end towards piety, and made a most religious death under
the name of Brother Honestus in the neighbouring abbey.  So Lawless had
his will, and died a friar.




Footnotes:


{1}  At the date of this story, Richard Crookback could not have been
created Duke of Gloucester; but for clearness, with the reader's leave,
he shall so be called.

{2}  Richard Crookback would have been really far younger at this date.

{3}  Technically, the term "lance" included a not quite certain number of
foot soldiers attached to the man-at-arms.