CHAPTER XIV.
The Pursuit.
"I wonder where the deuce Ned Hayward can be gone," was the exclamation of Sir John Slingsby about ten o'clock at night when he found that his young guest did not reappear; and so do I wonder, and perhaps so does the reader too. It will therefore be expedient, in order to satisfy all parties, to leave the good people at Tarningham-park and pursue our friend at once, for we have no time to spare if we would catch him. He is a desperate hard rider when there is any object in view, and he certainly left the park on horseback.
When last we saw him, the hour was about half-past seven or a quarter to eight, night was beginning to fall, and without doing any thing figurative in regard to the evening--without comparing the retiring rays of light to the retreat of a defeated army, or the changing colour of the sky to the contents of a London milkmaid's pail under the influence of the pump--we may be permitted to say that the heavens were getting very gray; the rose and the purple had waned, and night, heavy night, was pouring like a deluge through the air. Nevertheless, the night was fine, a star or two shone out, and the moment Ned Hayward sprang to the window through which the ball had come, he saw a figure hurrying away through the trees at the distance of about three hundred yards. They were fine old trees with no underwood--English park trees, wide apart, far-spreading, gigantic; and Ned Hayward paused an instant to gaze after he had jumped out of the window, and then took to his heels and ran on as fast as a pair of long, strong, well-practised legs would carry him. There was turf below him and his feet fell lightly, but he had not gained more than fifty yards upon the figure when he saw through the bolls another figure not human but equine. For a short distance the person he pursued did not seem aware that he had a follower, but before the time arrived when the horse became apparent some indications seemed to reach his ear, and, if Ned Hayward ran quick, the other seemed to run nearly as fast. When the young gentleman was within about a hundred yards of him, however, the man was upon the horse's back and galloping away.
Ned Hayward stopped and followed him with his eyes, marking the course he took as far as the light would permit. He then listened, and heard the noise of the horse's feet distinctly beating the ground in one direction. The next moment the sounds became confused with others, as if another horse were near, and turning round to the road which led from the gate on the side of Tarningham, the young officer saw a mounted man coming slowly up towards the house.
"By Jove, this is lucky!" said Ned Hayward, as he recollected having heard Sir John Slingsby tell a groom to carry a note to Mr. Wharton, the lawyer: and running down to the road as fast as possible, he stopped the servant, and bade him dismount and let him have the horse immediately.
The groom recognised his master's guest; but he had some hesitation, and began his reply with a "Please, Sir--" But Ned cut him short at once, in a very authoritative tone; and in two minutes he was in the saddle. He paused not an instant to think, for calculation was a very rapid process with him, and, during his morning's rambles, he had marked, with a soldier's eye, all the bearings and capabilities of the park and the ground round about it. The result of his combinations was thus expressed upon the mental tablet, or nearly thus:--
"The fellow cannot get out by the way he has taken; for there is no gate, and the park paling is planted at the top of the high bank, so that no man in England dare leap it. He must take to the right or left. On the left he will be checked by the river and the thick copse which would bring him round close to the house again. He will, therefore, take to the right, and pass the gates on the top of the hill. He must come down half way to the other gates, however, before he can get out of the lane; and I shall not be much behind him."
He rode straight, therefore, to the gates on the Tarningham side, passed them, turned sharp to the left, galloped up the sandy lane under the park wall, and blessed his stars as he saw the edge of the moon beginning to show itself in the east.
"Hang me if I give up the chase till I have run him down," said Ned Hayward; but when a man sets out hunting a fox with such a determination, he never knows how far the fox or the determination may lead him. Away he went, however, like a shot. The horse was a strong, well-built cob, of about fourteen hands three, which had been accustomed to bear the great bulk and heavy riding of Sir John Slingsby to cover; and it sprang out under the lighter weight and better balance of the younger man, as if it had a feather on its back. Up this hill they went, all gathered together like a woolpack: an easy hand, an easy seat, and an exact poise, made the rider feel to the beast not half his real weight; and, in two minutes, Ned Hayward's quick ear caught the sound of other hoofs besides those underneath him. "I shall have him now!" he said; but suddenly the sounds became fainter. Three springs more and he had the horseman before him; but at a hundred and fifty yards' distance, going over the moor. There was a fence and ditch on the right hand; and Ned Hayward pushed his horse at them. The good little beast rose gallantly by the moonlight; but there was a ditch on the other side also, which neither saw. He cleared it with his fore-feet, but his hind went in, and over he came sprawling. Neither rider nor beast were hurt; and Ned Hayward picked him up in a minute, and away again.
The fugitive had gained ground, nevertheless, and was shooting off like a falling star; but the moonlight was now bright, lying in long misty lines upon the moor. A few rapid steps brought them to the sandy road, and on--on they dashed as if for life. On, however, dashed the other horseman likewise. He knew the ground well, his horse was good, he really rode for life. It was as even a race as ever was seen. The wide moor extended for miles, every tree and bush was visible, and even the distant belts of planting where the common ended on the right could be seen lying black and heavy against the moonlight sky; but yet there was a darkness over the ground which showed that it was not day; and still, as he urged the willing beast forward, Ned Hayward kept a ready hand upon the bridle in case of need. Soon he thought he gained upon the other, but then he saw him turn from the sandy road and take over the turf to the left. Ned Hayward ran across, and pressed hard the beast's sides. On, on they went; but the next instant the ground seemed darker before him, and the pursuer checked up his horse suddenly upon the very edge of a deep pit, while the other rode on unobstructed on the further side.
Not more than a moment was lost or gained, however, for turning quickly round the edge of the pit, though keeping a sharper eye upon the ground than before, Ned Hayward still followed a diagonal course, which saved him as much of the distance between him and the fugitive as he had lost by the temporary check. When he, too, had got to the other side of the pit, the space between them was about the same that it had been at first, but the ground sloped gently downward, and then spread out in a perfect flat with neither trees nor bushes, although some thick rushy spots assumed here and there the appearance of bunches of bramble, or bilberry, but afforded no interruption to the horses' speed, and on they went, helter skelter, over the moor, as if the great enemy were behind them.
In a few minutes a light was visible on the right, and Ned Hayward said to himself, "He is making for some house;" but the next instant the light moved, flitting along from spot to spot, with a blue, wavering, uncertain flame, and with a low laugh, the young gentleman muttered, "A will-o'-the-wisp, that shan't lead me astray this time at least."
On he dashed keeping the horseman before him; but ere he had passed the meteor a hundred yards, he felt the pace of his horse uneasy, the ground seemed to quiver and shake under his rapid footfalls, and a plashy sound was heard, as if the hoofs sank into a wet and marshy soil.
"A shaking bog, upon my life," said Ned Hayward, "but as he has gone over it, so can I."
With his horse's head held lightly up, his heels into its sides, the bridle shaken every minute to give him courage, and a loud "Tally ho!" as if he were in sight of a fox, on went Ned Hayward with the water splashing up around him till the hoofs fell upon firmer ground, and a slight slope upwards caught the moonlight, and showed the fugitive scampering away with a turn to the right.
"Hoiks, hoiks! haloo!" cried Ned Hayward, applying the flat of his hand to the horse's flank, and, as if inspired by the ardour of the chase, the brave little beast redoubled its efforts, and strained up the hill after the larger horse, gaining perceptibly upon it.
Clear and full in the moonlight the dark figure came out from the sky as he cleared the edge of the hill, and in two seconds, or not much more, Ned Hayward gained the same point.
The figure was no longer visible. It had disappeared as if by magic; horse and rider were gone together, and all that could be seen was the gentle slope downward that lay at the horse's feet, a darkish spot beyond, which the moon's rays did not reach, and then the moor extending for about a couple of miles further, marked in its undulations by strong light and shade.
"Why, what the devil is this?" exclaimed Ned Hayward; but though he sometimes indulged in an exclamation, he never let astonishment stop him, and seeing that if the figure had taken a course to the right or left he must have caught sight of it, he rode straight at the dark spot in front, and found that it consisted of one of the large pits, with which the moor was spotted, filled to the very top of the banks with low stunted oaks, ashes, and birch trees.
"Earthed him! earthed him!" said Ned Hayward, as he looked round, but he made no further observation, and soon perceived the sandy cart-road which the man must have taken to descend into the pit.
The young gentleman was now a little puzzled; the natural pertinacity and impetuosity of his disposition would have led him to plunge in after the object of his chase, like a terrier dog after a badger, but then he saw that by so doing, the man, who knew the ground apparently much better than he did, would have the opportunity of doubling upon him and escaping his pursuit, while he was losing himself among the trees and paths. Rapid in all his calculations, and seeing that the extent of the hollow was not very great, so that by the aid of the moonlight, any figure which issued forth would become visible to him as long as he remained above, Ned Hayward trotted round the edge of the pit to make himself perfectly sure that there was no small path or break in the banks, by which the object he had lodged in the bushes beneath him, might effect its flight without his perceiving it. Having ascertained this fact, he took up his position on the highest ground near, that he might command the whole scene round, and then dismounting, led his horse up and down to cool it gradually, saying to himself, "I will stop here all night rather than lose him. Some persons must come by in the morning who will help mc to beat the bushes."
Ned Hayward concluded his reflections, however, with a sentence which seemed to have very little connexion with them.
"She's an exceedingly pretty girl," he said, "and seems to be as amiable as she is pretty, but I can't let that stop me."
I do not at all understand what he meant, but perhaps the reader may find some sense in it. But while he was reflecting on pretty girls, and combining them in the honestest way possible with his hunt after a man who had fired a shot into the window of Tarningham House, an obtrusive recollection crossed his mind that moons will go down, and that then wide open moors with many a shaking bog and pitfall were not the most lustrous and well-lighted places upon earth, which remembrance or reflection puzzled him most exceedingly. Though we have never set up Ned Hayward for a conjuror, he was an exceedingly clever, dashing, and amiable person; but he was far from being either a magician or an astronomer, and not having an almanack in his pocket, nor able to read it if he had, he was not at all aware of the hour at which the moon went down. He saw, indeed, that she had already passed her prime, and was verging towards decline, and it was with a very unpleasant sensation that he thought, "Hang her old untidy horns, she will be gone before the day breaks, and a pleasant dark place it will be when she no longer gives me light. I will stop and watch, however, but I must change my tactics, and hide under the hill. Perhaps he may think I am gone, and come out with fresh courage. The young blackguard! it would be a good turn to all the world to hang him, if it is but to prevent him marrying such a nice girl as that, who is a great deal too good for him. He won't thank me, however, for my pains."
This thought, somehow or other, was not pleasant to our friend Ned Hayward, and, indeed, like most of us, in many even of the ordinary circumstances of life, he was affected by very different emotions. Why it was, or wherefore, he could not tell, but he had been seized with a strong inclination to hang, or otherwise dispose of any gentleman whom he could suspect of being a favoured lover of Mary Clifford's; and, yet on the other hand he had every disposition in the world to oblige Mary Clifford himself. These two objects seemed incompatible, but there is a fashion in the world which has a strange knack of trying to overcome impossibilities, and sometimes succeeds too--at least in overcoming those things which fathers and mothers, relations, guardians and friends, have pronounced to be insurmountable. At all events Ned Hayward made up his mind that it was his duty not to abandon his pursuit so long as there was a chance of its being successful, and, consequently, he drew his horse a little further from the edge of the pit, as soon as he had considered the peculiar circumstances of Mistress Moon, and endeavoured to keep out of sight as far as possible, while he himself watched eagerly, with nothing but his head as far as the eyes above the edge of the acclivity.
Fancy is a wonderful thing, and it has been accounted for some people as good as physic. I should say it was better for most men, but yet, taken in too large doses it is dangerous, very dangerous. Now Ned Hayward had, that night, taken too large a dose, and the effect was this: he imagined he was perfectly well acquainted with the figure, person, and appearance of the horseman whom he had hunted from under the walls of Tarningham-park to the spot where he then stood, with his horse's bridle over his arm. He could have sworn to him!--very lucky it was that nobody called upon him to do so, as he found out within a quarter of an hour afterwards. Fancy painted his face and his figure, and a tremendous black eye, and a bruised cut down the side of his nose. Now as the man lay there quietly ensconced in the pit, his face was very different, his figure not at all the same, and no black eye, no bruised cut, gave evidence of the scuffle which took place two nights before. It was, in fact, quite a different person, and all the young gentleman's calculations were wrong together. It is a very happy thing indeed for a man in the wrong, when he acts in the same manner as he would if he were right. His doing so, it is true, sometimes proceeds from good sense, sometimes from good feeling, sometimes from fortunate circumstances, but, at all events, such was Ned Hayward's case in the present instance, for he had made up his mind to remain upon the watch, and he would have watched as zealously and only a little more pleasantly, if he had known perfectly well who the man was, instead of mistaking him for another. When he had remained about seven minutes and a half, however--I cannot speak to a few seconds more or less, and a slight mistake will make no great difference, as the first heat was over, and our friends were only taking breathing time; but when he had remained for about seven minutes and a half, his horse shied at something behind him, and when the young gentleman turned round, he perceived a long shadow cross the space of moonlight on the common, showing that some living object was moving in a slanting direction between him and the south-western side of the sky. The first question he asked himself was naturally, who he could be, and the first answer that suggested itself was, "Perhaps one of this fellow's comrades."
Two to one, however, were not odds that at all daunted our young friend; and turning quite round, for an instant he looked at the figure as it came down, and then directed his eyes towards the edge of the pit again. He kept a sharp look upon the approaching party, however, nor, though the step upon the soft turf made no great sound, his eyes were suddenly brought round upon the visitor of his solitary watch, when about ten yards still remained between them. The moon now served our good friend as well as if he had been a lover, showing him distinctly the face, features, and figure of the person before him, and he instantly exclaimed,--
"Ah, Stephen, this is lucky! What brought you here?"
"Why, Sir," answered the man, "this is part of my beat, and as soon as I had got some supper down at the village, as it is not fair to take a gentleman's money without doing something for it, and as I am rather accustomed to a walk on a moonlight night, I might as well just come out to see that all is safe. I can guess what brought you here, for Ned, the groom, told me you had taken his horse and were off like a shot."
"Hush," said Ned Hayward, "don't speak so loud, my good fellow; I have earthed him amongst those trees in the pit there, but I could not dig him out, for I was afraid he would escape one way while I was hunting him the other."
"Ah! ah! you have got him, then?" said Gimlet, "then, that's a piece of luck. If he swings it will be no bad job; a bloody-minded scoundrel!"
Ned Hayward was somewhat surprised to hear his friend Wolf qualify by so unsavoury an epithet a gentleman, whose friend and companion he had very lately been; the young officer, however, knew a good deal of the world and the world's ways, and he was not at all inclined to honour the ci-devant poacher for so sudden a change of opinion. His first thought was, this man must be a scoundrel at heart, after all, to abuse a man whom he has been consorting with in this manner, without any motive for so doing, except the simple fact of a change in his own avocations. If he thought young Wittingham a very respectable person two or three hours ago, when he himself was only Wolf the poacher, I do not understand why he should judge him a bloody-minded villain, now that he himself has become Stephen Gimlet, second keeper to Sir John Slingsby. This does not look like honesty.
A second thought, however, upon all he had seen of the man's character, the frankness, the hardihood, even the dogged determination he had shown induced Captain Hayward to say to himself, "The fellow can't know who it is;" and as thought is a very rapid thing, he replied with a perceptible pause, "Yes, I have got him, safe and sure, and if you'll help he cannot get away. You guess who he is, I dare say, Stephen?"
"O, to be sure, Sir," answered Gimlet; "it is that young scoundrel, Harry Wittingham. Bad's the crow and bad's the egg," he continued, without knowing he was using a Greek proverb, "I suppose it can be no one else; for I heard from the old housekeeper down in the town, that he swore like fury that he would have vengeance on his father if he laid the information against him before Sir John."
"Humph!" said Ned Hayward; "but then," he thought, "l am rather hard upon the man too. The idea of any one in cold blood firing a shot at his own father is certainly enough to rouse the indignation and disgust even of men who would wink at, or take part in, lesser crimes to which they are more accustomed. Come, Stephen," he continued aloud, "now you are here, we may do better than I could alone. Let us see what is to be done."
"O, we'll soon manage it, Sir," answered Wolf, "I know every bit of the pit well enough; there is but one place he can go to with his horse, and but one road up the bank. He can round the inside of the pit two ways, sure enough, but what we had best do is, to go in till we can see what he is about, and then have a rush upon him together or separate, or out him off either way."
Captain Hayward agreed in this view of the case, and after a few more words of consultation, the horse was fastened to a scraggy hawthorn tree, and stooping down as low as possible to conceal their approach, Captain Hayward and his companion advanced along the cart-road down into the pit. The moment after they began to descend, the bank on the right cast a shadow over them, which favoured their operations, and Gimlet, taking the lead, crept silently along a path which had once served for the waggons that carried the sand out of the pit, but was now overgrown with grass and hemmed in with bushes, shrubs, and trees of forty or fifty years growth. No moonlight penetrated there, and all was dark, gloomy, and intricate. Now the path turned to the right, now to the left, then proceeded straight forward again, and then began to mount a little elevation in the surface, or floor, as the miners would call it, of the pit itself, still thickly surrounded by green shrubs, through which, however, the slanting beams of the moon were shining over the edge of the pit. Stephen Gimlet's steps became even still more quiet and cautious, and he whispered to Ned Hayward to walk lightly for fear the fugitive should catch a sound of their approach, and make his escape. Each step occupied several seconds, so carefully was it planted; the slight rustling of the leaves, catching upon their clothes, and each falling back upon a branch, which, pushed aside as they passed, was dashed back upon those behind, made them pause and listen, thinking that the object of their eager pursuit must have caught the sound as well as their own nearer ears. At length Stephen Gimlet stopped, and putting back his hand, helped his companion aloof for an instant, while he leaned forward and brought his eyes close to a small hole between the branches. Then, drawing Ned Hayward forward, he pointed in the same direction in which he had been looking, with his right finger, and immediately laid it upon his lips as a token to be silent. Ned Hayward bent his head and gazed through the aperture as his companion had done. The scene before him was a very peculiar one. In broken beams, filtered, as we may call it, by the green leaves and higher branches, the moonlight was streaming upon a small open space, where the ground rose into a swelling knoll, covered with green turf and moss. There was one small birch-tree in the midst, and a hawthorn by its side, but all the rest was clear, and on the right hand could be seen, marked out by the yellow sand, the cart-road which led to the moor above. Standing close to the two little trees was a horse, a fine, strong, powerful bay, with a good deal of bone and sinew, long in the reach, but what is unusual in horses of that build, with a chine and shoulder like those of a wild boar. Close to the horse, with the bridle thrown over his arm, and apparently exceedingly busy upon something he was doing, stood a tall, powerful man, whose face, from the position in which he had placed himself, could not be seen; his back, in short, was towards Ned Hayward and his companion, but from under his left arm protruded part of the stock of a gun, which a moonbeam that fell upon it, showed as plainly as the daylight could have done. From the position in which he held the firelock it seemed to Ned Hayward as if he were attending to the priming, and the moment afterwards the click of the pan showed that the supposition was correct.
At the same time this sound met his ear the young gentleman was drawn gently back by the hand of his companion, and the latter whispered, "That's Harry Wittingham's horse, I'd swear to him amongst a thousand, but that's not Henry Wittingham himself, of that I'm quite sure."
"I cannot see his face," answered Ned Hayward, in the same low tone, "but the figure seems to me very much the same."
"Hush! he's moving," said the man; "better let us go round and cut him off by either road, you to the right and I to the left--straight through that little path there--we shall have a shot for it, but we must not mind that--see he is looking at his girths."
The man whom they spoke of had seemed perfectly unconscious of the presence of any such unwelcome visitors near him. His motions were all slow and indifferent, till the last words had passed Stephen Gimlet's lips; then, however, he turned suddenly round, displaying a face that Captain Hayward did not at all recollect, and gazing direct to the spot where they stood, he raised his gun, already cocked, to his shoulder, and fired.
Fortunately, it so happened that Ned Hayward had taken one step in the direction which his companion had pointed out, otherwise the ball, with which the piece was charged, would have passed right through his breast. As it was, it grazed his left arm, leaving a slight flesh wound, and, seeing that they were discovered, both he and Stephen Gimlet dashed straight through the trees towards the object of their pursuit. He, in the meantime, had put his foot in the stirrup, and sprung upon his horse's back. One rushed at him on either side, but perchance, at all hazards and at all events, without a moment's consideration, the man dashed at the poacher, brandishing the gun which he held in his hand like a club. As he came up without giving ground an inch, Stephen clutched at his bridle, receiving a tremendous blow with the stock of his gun, and attempting to parry it with his left hand. The man raised his rein, however, at the same moment he struck the blow, and Stephen missed the bridle. He struck at him, with his right, however, in hope of bringing him from his horse, and with such force and truth did he deliver his reply to the application of the gun-stock, that the man bent down to the horse's mane, but at the same time he struck his spurs deep into the beast's flanks, passed his opponent with a spring, and galloped up to the moor.
"I am away after him," cried Ned Hayward, and darting along the road like lightning, he gained the common, unhooked his own horse from the tree, and recommenced the pursuit with the same figure still flying before him.
The steep rise of the pit had somewhat blown the fugitive's horse, and for the first hundred yards or so Captain Hayward gained upon him, but he soon brought all his knowledge of the country to bear, every pond, every bank, every quagmire, gave him some advantage, and when, at the end of about ten minutes, they neared the plantations at the end of the moor, he was considerably further from his pursuers than when their headlong race began. At length he disappeared where the road led in amongst trees and hedgerows, and any further chase seemed to promise little. Ned Hayward's was a sadly persevering disposition, however; he had an exceedingly great dislike to be frustrated in any thing, and on he therefore rode without drawing a rein, thinking, "in this more populous part of the country I shall surely meet with some whom he has passed, and who will give me information."
It was a wonderfully solitary, a thinly peopled district, however, which lay on the other side of the moor from Tarningham. They went early to bed, too, in that part of the world, and not a living soul did Ned Hayward meet for a full mile up the long lane. At the end of that distance, the road branched into three, and in the true spirit of knight-errantry, the young gentleman threw down his rein on the horse's neck, leaving it to carry him on in search of adventures, according to its own sagacity. The moor was about four miles and a half across; but in the various turnings and windings they had taken, now here now there upon its surface, horse and man had contrived to treble that distance, or perhaps something more. There had been a trot to the town before and back again, a hand-canter through the park, and then a tearing burst across the moor. The horse therefore thought, with some reason, that there had been enough of riding and being ridden for one night, and as soon as Ned Hayward laid down the reins it fell from a gallop to a canter, from a canter to a trot, and was beginning to show an inclination to a walk, if not to stand still, when Ned Hayward requested it civilly with his heels to go on a little faster. It had now selected its path, however, remembering Ovid's axiom, that the middle of the road is the safest. This was all that Ned Hayward could have desired at its hands, if it had had any; but of its hoofs he required that they should accelerate their motions, and on he went again at a rapid pace, till, suddenly turning into a high road, he saw nearly before him on the left hand, six large elms in a row, with a horse-trough under the two nearest; an enormous sign swinging between the two central trees, and an inn, with four steps up to the door, standing a little back from the road.
There was a good light streaming from some of the windows; the moon was shining clear, but the dusty old elms were thick with foliage, which effectually screened the modest figures on the sign from the garish beams of either the domestic or the celestial luminary.
Ned Hayward drew in his rein as soon as he beheld the inn and its accompaniments; then approached softly, paused to consider, and ultimately rode into the court-yard, without troubling the people of the house with any notification of his arrival. He found two men in the yard in stable dresses, who immediately approached with somewhat officious civility, saying, "Take your horse, Sir?"
And Ned Hayward, dismounting slowly, like a man very much tired, gave his beast into their hands, and affected to saunter quietly back to the inn, while they led his quiet little cob into the stables. Then suddenly turning, after he had taken twenty steps, he followed at a brisk pace, he passed the stable-door, walking deliberately down the whole row of horses in the stalls, till he stopped opposite one--a bright bay, with a long back, and thick, high crest, which was still covered with lather, and had evidently been ridden furiously not many minutes before.
Turning suddenly to the ostler and his help, who had evidently viewed his proceedings with more consternation than was quite natural, he placed himself between them and the door and demanded with a bent brow and a stern tone, "Where is the master of this horse?"
The help, who was nearest, gasped in his face like a caught trout, but the ostler pushed him aside, and replied instantly, "He is in-doors, Sir, in number eleven."
And turning on his heel, Ned Hayward immediately entered the inn.