CHAPTER XXIV.
It was nine o'clock before Sir John Newark entered the room where preparations had been made for breakfast. He found his son Richard talking gaily to Emmeline in the window, while she replied with a bright and smiling face. Although, considering his designs respecting Emmeline and his son, it might be supposed that such a sight was pleasant to him, yet that poisoner of all peace, suspicion, would not have it so. Emmeline's excessive anxiety during the preceding day, after tidings had been received of Smeaton's capture, had not escaped his notice, although she had striven hard to conceal the emotions which were busy in her bosom, and now she seemed so bright and cheerful that he said to himself, "She must have some intelligence."
He resolved to watch her carefully; but, happily for Emmeline, emotions as strong, though very different from, those of the day before, had still possession of her. They were more joyful, more hopeful, but perhaps even more thrilling; and, several times during the meal, she fell into deep fits of thought. Suspicion is always vacillating, and Sir John began to doubt whether he had been right or not. His son contributed, too, to remove the fancy which possessed him by saying, with one of his wild laughs, towards the middle of breakfast. "I was telling Emmy when you came in, father, that we should have this Colonel Lord back again here very soon. Great fish always lie on the same bank."
"I do not know, Dick," replied his father, gravely. "I think it is very improbable you will ever see him again. If he is wise, he will betake himself to France immediately. Otherwise he may very well chance to leave his head on the scaffold some morning."
Richard laughed, exclaiming. "Well then, he had a great deal better kick it before him across the sea. A precious foot-ball it would make."
Emmeline gave a slight shudder, and Sir John dropped the conversation till the meal was ended, when he said, "The Earl's servant is here, as I dare say you know, Dick; but he has had no news of his master, and fancies he must be at Keanton."
"Oh, I know Higham is here," answered the lad; "for I had a long talk with him just before you sent for him. He told me all about the rescue. What fun it must have been to see those lubberly soldiers all tied, and lying heads and tails like herrings in a barrel! I wish I had been there. I should have liked to help poor Smeaton, and leather the jacket of that long captain. Higham says his master knocked him down just as he did the Earl of Stair's great bully, and vows that the punch-bowls jumped up a foot off the table with the shock of his fall."
"Well, Dick," observed his father, "the servant talks of riding over by the tops of the downs to Keanton to see for his lord. Now, as you know there is nothing I would so willingly do as assist this noble gentleman, you and I will ride over with the man to within half a mile of Keanton. Then, if he finds his master, we can establish some communication with him, and perhaps assist him."
He paused a moment, and then, turning to Emmeline, he added; "I fear you cannot go with us, my dear child. Maiden modesty forbids your running about the country to inquire for a young cavalier. I think, too, it might be as well for you to remain within during our absence. There will be parties of soldiers, doubtless, scouring the country in various directions, and they are neither the most civil or civilized."
"I have no inclination to go out," replied Emmeline, simply. "I am tired with all the anxiety of yesterday."
Sir John Newark, his son, and Smeaton's servant, were soon on horseback; and, without any other attendant, they set out, turning sharp to the left after quitting the gates of the Manor House, and winding round the edge of the woods till they reached nearly the top of Ale Head. Thence pursuing their course across the downs, with the high cliffs beetling over the sea at the distance of about a quarter of a mile on their left, they continued their course, alternately rising and descending up the brown hills and down into the green solitary hollows which extend fifteen or sixteen miles along the coast.
At the distance of about seven miles from Ale Manor, however, they came to one of these hollows, which assumed more the appearance of a regular valley, with a bright and beautiful little stream flowing down it towards the sea. Here they halted; Higham received instructions to ride on before, while the other two slowly followed, and Sir John added:
"We will wait at the distance of about half a mile from Keanton. Tell your Lord that we are there, if he thinks it safe to come and speak with us. If not, bring us some tidings of him; but enter the village very cautiously, lest the good people of Keanton should have fallen into the hands of the Philistines."
Higham nodded his head and rode away. Sir John Newark, who had been very silent during the first part of the journey, now entered into an eager conversation with his son, which, as I must refer to it afterwards, I need not notice more particularly here. Suffice it to say, that the father spoke, earnestly and apparently impressively, and that the son, though at first he listened with eagerness and looks of surprise, and strove afterwards to fix his wandering attention upon his father's words, soon resumed his usual manner, and laughed and talked gaily and wildly, flitting round the subject rather than resting upon it.
After they had reached the spot which had been fixed upon as their halting-place, Sir John and his young companion remained for about three quarters of an hour in expectation, Richard getting off and on his horse, throwing pebbles into the stream, and showing many signs of impatience. Sir John marked him with a slight smile, and at length Higham made his appearance again, trotting quietly and unconcernedly down towards them.
"He is not there, Sir John," said the man, riding up "at least so all the people say; but they are mighty stingy of their words this morning. However, one thing is certain. They have heard nothing of the Exeter people, and I make out pretty surely that my Lord is not very far off, and that they know it."
"Ah, how do you make that out?" asked Sir John Newark.
"Why, one man began talking about a stranger having come to Blacklands late last night; but his wife stopped his mouth in a minute; and, when I asked where Blacklands was and what it was, he gave a rambling sort of answer. But, I believe, it must be some farm near at hand."
"It is five miles off," replied Sir John, immediately; "a wild and solitary place, shut out from the whole neighbourhood, and a very likely spot indeed for a fugitive to take refuge in. We had better ride over there. You are sure there are no soldiers in the village?"
"Not a man, sir," answered Higham; "and besides, they have got people on the top of the hill to look out."
"Well then, we will take that way, as it is the shortest," said the knight--"Come, Richard."
"I think I shall go back," said Richard Newark. "I am tired of this work. I'll go back and have a gossip with Enemy."
"Do not be rash, Dick," replied his father, holding up his finger, with a smile. "Remember, slow degrees at first! You do not scare birds that you want to drive into a net."
The lad laughed, and saying, "Oh, I'll not be rash," turned his horse's head, and cantered quietly away. When he had gone about a couple of miles, however, he fell into deep thought, took his feet out of the stirrups, let the reins drop on the horse's neck, and, for more than half an hour, proceeded at a walk. Then, as if suddenly rousing himself, he whistled a bit of a light air, put his horse into a quick pace again, and rode on to the Manor House.
It was very usual with Richard to stand in the stable-yard after a ride, till he had seen saddle and bridle removed and the horse rubbed down; but now he left his beast immediately in the hands of the groom, and walked across the court till he came to a place where a large Irish eagle was chained to a heavy perch. The bird was fierce and untameable; but Richard approached it without fear, and took hold of the padlock on its leg. He had hardly done so when it struck him with its bill more than once; but he proceeded boldly till he had unfastened the chain from its leg, and given it a vehement push from the perch. The bird instantly took wing, and soared into the sky. Richard Newark laughed aloud, and, without looking after it, wiped some drops of blood from his forehead, and walked into the house. He pursued his way quietly through the passages, looked into the lesser and the greater saloon, and then, mounting the stairs, walked up to the door of Emmeline's sitting-room. There he paused a moment; and then, murmuring: "What a fool I am!--but I knew that long ago," he opened the door without knocking, and went in. Emmeline was seated near the window, gazing down upon the woods below; but she turned instantly at her cousin's step, and started up, exclaiming--
"What is the matter, Richard? What has happened? The blood is streaming down your face!"
"Nothing at all has happened, Emmy dear," replied Richard. "Only, as often occurs in this world, a friend took me for an enemy, and pecked my pate. Come here and sit down, and I will tell you all about it, though there is nothing worth hearing to tell. Sit down here, Emmy," he continued, again wiping away the blood, "There, put yourself in that chair; and I will sit on the stool at your feet, as I used to do before they sent me to school to see what part of my brain was sound."
"But what have you been doing, Richard?" said Emmeline, seating herself as he desired her.
"Nothing but giving liberty to an eagle," replied the boy; "and he pecked me while I was unchaining his foot."
"Oh, you should not have done that, Dickon," said his fair companion. "Your father will be angry."
"Why so?" demanded the lad. "The bird was mine. He was given to me, and I had a right to do what I liked with him. Well, Emmy," he continued, after a moment or two, "we have heard nothing of Smeaton, and a dull ride we have had of it. So I left my daddy to trot on his way, and came back."
Emmeline was silent; for she did not wish to speak upon the subject of her lover at all; but Richard went on in a rambling sort of tone, saying,
"Ay, dull enough it was; and, while we were waiting for Tom Higham's coming back, my father had some serious conversation with me, as he calls it. I hate serious conversation, Emmy."
"But you should always attend to what your father says to you, Richard," observed Emmeline, "and to everything that he tells you, which is right."
The last words were uttered after a moment's pause, and in a lower tone.
"Very true," replied Richard, half laughing. "What you say is always true, Emmy, but the worst of it is--I suppose the soft place in my brain prevents it--my father and I can never agree upon what is quite right. The fact is, dear girl, I see one side, and he sees the other, as the old story-book has it; and, if one side is black, and the other side is white, we can never agree in opinion. Do you know what he was telling me to-day?
"No, indeed," answered Emmeline. "I cannot conceive."
"Why, he was telling me," said Richard, looking down and speaking in an absent manner--"he was telling me that he intended me to marry you and you to marry me; that it must be; that the fate and fortune of us both depended upon it."
Emmeline trembled violently; and, as the shoulder of Richard Newark rested against her arm, he felt how much agitation his words produced. The moment after, Emmeline felt his hand laid gently upon hers, and she asked, in a low voice,
"What did you say to him, Richard?"
"Nothing much to the purpose," replied Richard; "for he set all my thoughts rambling and galloping like huntsmen at the field-halloo. I laughed and talked as if I had been very happy; but I was thinking all the time, Emmeline. First, I thought (what I never thought of before) how very happy it would be to marry you--and how you might make anything you liked of me--and what a changed being I should be if you were my wife--and how dearly I should love you--and how I do love you--and a great many other foolish things. Nay, don't shake, dear Emmy! There is no fear with your own poor Dick."
"I am not afraid, Dick," responded Emmeline, pressing the hand he had laid upon hers; "for I know right well that, whatever faults your head may have, your heart has none."
"That's a good girl," returned Richard Newark. "Well, I thought a great deal more still. After all these foolish things had had their gallop, I thought I would not marry you for the whole world; or if all the kings and queens in the world were to try to force us."
"Indeed, Richard?" said Emmeline, with a faint smile. "You had good reasons, doubtless."
"To be sure I had," replied the lad. "In the first place, I know that I am not worthy of you, that I am not fit for you. In the next place, I know that you would not like it; that you love another; and, that, if you were driven to marry me, you would always be thinking of him, and loving him, and not me. I should be your jailor, and not your husband, and I should be wretched too; for I should be always flying after your thoughts, like a sparrow-hawk after a lark, to see if you were not thinking of your lover all the time. You know you love him, Emmy. You love him very well, very dearly, and I do not wonder at you."
The rosy colour that spread over her face, and neck, and forehead would have been sufficient answer; but she said, in a low though distinct tone--
"I do."
There was a pause, of a moment or two, and then Richard said--
"What a fool I should be, Emmeline--a greater fool than I am, and that is bad enough--if I suffered my wits to be set wool-gathering by any nonsense about ever marrying you, or putting Smeaton out of your head. But still, Emmy," he continued, in a tender tone, "you will love me after a sort--as you always have--as a kind friend--as a sister."
"Indeed I will, Richard," exclaimed Emmeline, earnestly, "and love you all the better for your conduct this day. Now I know what you mean by setting the eagle free; you would fain set Smeaton free of all difficulties, if you could."
"No, dear Emmy," pursued Richard; "I did not exactly mean that. Indeed I do not clearly know that I meant anything; but, as I rode homeward, and thought how happy you might be if people left you to do just what you liked, I wished to help you to do so--to make you quite free; and then, when saw the poor eagle in the court, I thought how happy he would be if he could soar away in the skies again at his own pleasure, and then the thought came across me of what my father would say if I unchained the bird's leg, and I answered myself, that I had a right--that the bird was mine--that he had been given to me, and so had you; and, therefore, I determined to set you both free. I do not know how it was; but, somehow, there seemed a likeness between your fate and his; though when he fluttered his wings, and struck at me, as I unchained him, I said to myself, Emmeline will know better, and so she does."
"Indeed she does, Richard," replied Emmeline; "and she will never mistake you for an enemy."
"But do you know, Emmeline," continued her cousin, "that I have a strange notion it would be better for us both to dissemble a little? for I fancy my father has some suspicion about you and Smeaton."
"I fear I am a bad dissembler," returned Emmeline, incautiously. "I cannot but dread that Sir John sees I have been dissembling with him lately."
Richard, however, did not ask in what respect, but rambled on as usual.
"Oh, we all dissemble more than we are aware," he said. "Here, I never thought to deceive my father in anything; and yet, for some reason--either from something in himself or in me--I never can tell him all I think. I never can turn my heart inside out before him, as I can with you. When I should most wish to say all, and make him understand everything that is going on inside of me, some devil, I think it is, comes and stops me, and makes me go rambling away with vague answers about nothing at all, which he may take one way or another, just as he likes. But what I mean is, not that we should just exactly dissemble; for, as you love me well, and I love you well, it is not dissembling to seem to do so. I would only have you look happy when I am with you, and I'll try to make you so too; for I'll talk to you of Smeaton, and we'll plan plans and plot plots about him, and all sorts of pleasant things."
"There can be no harm in that, Richard," replied Emmeline, in a graver tone than her young cousin had expected; for he was trying, though hardly knowing it, to win her mind away from all heavy thoughts. But, to say sooth, Emmeline was somewhat puzzled how to act towards him. There was so much candour, so much frank kindness, in his whole conduct, that her heart smote her for not telling him all she knew and all she intended. She remembered, however, that the secrets in her heart were not altogether her own--that she had only a divided right over them; and, though it cost her some pain, she was silent.
Richard went on talking with her even after he heard the sounds which accompanied his father's return; and, when he left her and went down the stairs, although he was inclined to be more thoughtful than perhaps he had ever felt in his life, he assumed a gay and joyous look.
"Well, Dick," said his father, when he met him; "where have you been all this time?"
"I have been sitting with Emmeline ever since I came back," replied the lad; "and we have been talking of all sorts of things. She is a dear girl indeed."
"But what is the matter with your forehead?" said his father. "Did your horse fall?"
"Oh, no." cried Richard. "It was that brute of an eagle. I was tired of seeing him sitting moping on his perch; so I went to unchain him, and he pecked me on the head."
"Why, you foolish boy, you have not set him free?" exclaimed Sir John.
"Oh, yes, I have," answered Richard; "and he pecked me for my pains. But Emmeline did not peck me, whatever I said to her. So I care not. No chance of my being hen-pecked, father." And, with a gay laugh, he turned away.
Sir John Newark was well pleased with what he had done. "Women are strange beings," he said. "Who knows but what this boy's wild, dashing, lighted-hearted thoughtlessness--so like his weak mother--may not be metal more attractive in the girl's eyes than soberer sounder reason? At all events, he will be a check and a guard upon her; and even supposing her fancy has kindled into thoughts of love in the society of this young Earl, it can only render something for love to lean upon more needful to her when he is away. I have seen such things. It will do. I am glad I spoke to the boy and told him my intentions."
Sir John Newark thought he had more reason to congratulate himself still, when, a few hours afterwards, he received a peremptory summons to attend the authorities at Exeter on the following day. He mused for a minute or two before he returned an answer; but, in the end, he determined to assume a bold tone; and, calling for the messenger, he told him to inform those who sent him, that he (Sir John) would come right willingly, provided he was assured before noon that his house would be subject to no violence, and his family to no annoyance or insult, as on a former occasion.
"Hints are given in this letter," he said, "of a suspicion that the Earl of Eskdale is harbouring in this house or neighbourhood. Tell the high-sheriff, who seems taking upon him the office of Lord Lieutenant, that, after the proofs of loyalty which I have lately given, no such suspicion should be entertained; but, before you go, and while your horse is feeding, I insist upon it that, by search or cross-examination of the servants, and by inquiry in the village, you ascertain whether there be any ground whatever for such a doubt. Satisfy yourself fully, and then report accordingly; first to me, and then to those who sent you. I shall set off at eleven to-morrow for Aleton, and will thence go on to Exeter, if I am met there by a full and proper assurance that, when I return, I shall not find my house has been visited by a party of soldiers while I have been allured to a distance."
The man, who was a person of somewhat superior station and intelligence, took advantage of the permission given to him, and made himself, as he thought, perfectly certain that no one, in Ale Manor House at least, knew where the Earl of Eskdale was. The village, too, he visited; but there he got gruff and indifferent answers, and once or twice became somewhat afraid of pursuing his inquiries. Perhaps these fears tended to make him more easily satisfied than he otherwise would have been; but the conclusion he came to was, that the rough fishermen knew nothing of the matter, and did not like to be troubled with things that concerned them not. Before he departed, he saw Sir John Newark again, and told him the result of his inquiries. Sir John was very gracious; for the result was as satisfactory to him as it could be to any one.
"No," he said to himself, "no. He is at Blacklands, clear enough, though they would not own it. Or else this man; whom they spoke of going towards Exmouth, may have been he."
He dismissed the messenger, however, with a fee, as was not uncustomary in those venal times, and rested more tranquilly than he had done the night before, only wishing that he could hold some communication with the young Earl for a day or two, to fix his meditated grasp upon Keanton.