III.
[It was not long after this that John Ridd saw the signal that Lorna was in danger. With the aid of friends he planned and successfully executed a raid upon the Doone village, and carried away Lorna to his mother's house. Subsequently the Doones attacked the house where Lorna was staying, but John Ridd and his friends were prepared to meet them, as is related in the following scene:]
It was not likely that the outlaws would attack our premises until some time after the moon was risen, because it would be too dangerous to cross the flooded valleys in the darkness of the night. And, but for this consideration, I must have striven harder against the stealthy approach of slumber. But even so, it was very foolish to abandon watch, especially in such as I, who sleep like any dormouse. Moreover, I had chosen the very worst place in the world for such employment, with a goodly chance of awaking in a bed of solid fire.
And so it might have been—nay, it must have been—but for Lorna's vigilance. Her light hand upon my arm awoke me, not too readily, and, leaping up, I seized my club, and prepared to knock down somebody.
"Who's that?" I cried. "Stand back, I say, and let me have a fair chance at you."
"Are you going to knock me down, dear John?" replied the voice I love so well. "I am sure I should never get up again, after one blow from you, John."
"My darling, is it you?" I cried; "and breaking all your orders?
Come back into the house at once; and nothing on your head, dear."
"How could I sleep, while at any moment you might be killed beneath my window? And now is the time of real danger, for men can see to travel."
I saw at once the truth of this. The moon was high and clearly lighting all the watered valleys. To sleep any longer might be death, not only to myself, but all.
"The man on guard at the back of the house is fast asleep," she continued; "Gwenny, who let me out, and came with me, has heard him snoring for two hours. I think the women ought to be the watch, because they have had no traveling. Where do you suppose little Gwenny is?"
"Surely not gone to Glen Doone?" I was not sure, however, for I could believe almost anything of the Cornish maiden's hardihood.
"No," replied Lorna, "although she wanted even to do that. But, of course, I would not hear of it, on account of the swollen waters. But she is perched in yonder tree, which commands the Barrow Valley. She says that they are almost sure to cross the streamlet there."
"What a shame," I cried, "that the men should sleep and the maidens be the soldiers! I will sit in that tree myself, and send little Gwenny back to you. Go to bed, my best and dearest; I will take good care not to sleep again."
Before I had been long on duty, making the round of the ricks and the stables, and hailing Gwenny now and then from the bottom of her tree, a short, wide figure stole toward me, in and out the shadows, and I saw that it was no other than the little maid herself, and that she bore some tidings.
"Ten on 'em crossed the water down yonder," said Gwenny, putting her hand to her mouth, and seeming to regard it as good news rather than otherwise; "be arl craping up by the hedgerow now. I could shutt dree on 'em from the bar of the gate, if so be I had your goon, young man."
"There is no time to lose, Gwenny. Run to the house and fetch Master Stickles, and all the men while I stay here and watch the rick-yard."
The robbers rode into our yard as coolly as if they had been invited, having lifted the gate from the hinges first, on account of its being fastened. Then they actually opened our stable doors, and turned our honest horses out, and put their own rogues in place of them. At this my breath was quite
taken away, for we think so much of our horses. By this time I could see our troopers waiting in the shadow of the house round the corner from where the Doones were, and expecting the order to fire; but Jeremy Stickles very wisely kept them in readiness until the enemy should advance upon them.
"Two of you lazy fellows go,"—it was the deep voice of Carver Doone, "and make us a light to cut their throats by. Only one thing, once again. If any man touches Lorna, I will stab him where he stands. She belongs to me. There are two other young damsels here, whom you may take away if you please. And the mother, I hear, is still comely. Now for our rights. We have borne too long the insolence of these yokels. Kill every man and every child, and burn this cursed place down."
Presently two young men came toward me, bearing brands of resined hemp, kindled from Carver's lamp. The foremost of them set his torch to the rick within a yard of me, the smoke concealing me from him. I struck him with a backhanded blow on the elbow as he bent it, and I heard the bone of his arm break as clearly as ever I heard a twig snap. With a roar of pain, he fell on the ground, and his torch dropped there and singed him. The other man stood amazed at this, not having yet gained sight of me, till I caught his fire-brand from his hand, and struck it into his countenance. With that he leaped at me, but I caught him in a manner learned from early wrestling, and snapped his collar bone, as I laid him upon the top of his comrade.
This little success so encouraged me that I was half inclined to advance and challenge Carver Doone to meet me; but I bore in mind that he would be apt to shoot me without ceremony; and what is the utmost of human strength against the power of powder? Moreover, I remembered my promise to sweet Lorna; and who would be left to defend her, if the rogues got rid of me?
While I was hesitating thus, a blaze of fire lit up the house, and brown smoke hung around it. Six of our men had let go at the Doones, by Jeremy Stickles's order, as the villains came swaggering down in the moonlight ready for rape or murder. Two of them fell, and the rest hung back, to think at their leisure what this was. They were not used to this sort of thing; it was neither just nor courteous.
Being unable any longer to contain myself, as I thought of
Lorna's excitement at all this noise of firing, I ran across the yard, expecting whether they would shoot at me. However, no one shot at me; and I went up to Carver Doone, whom I knew by his size in the moonlight, and I took him by the beard and said, "Do you call yourself a man?"
For a moment he was so astonished that he could not answer. None had ever dared, I suppose, to look at him in that way. And then he tried a pistol at me; but I was too quick for him.
"Now, Carver, take warning," I said to him, very soberly; "you have shown yourself a fool by your contempt of me. I may not be your match in craft, but I am in manhood. You are a despicable villain. Lie low in your native muck."
And with that word I laid him flat upon his back in our straw-yard by the trick of the inner heel, which he could not have resisted unless he were a wrestler. Seeing him down, the others ran, though one of them made a shot at me, and some of them got their horses before our men came up, and some went away without them. And among these last was Captain Carver, who arose while I was feeling myself (for I had a little wound), and strode away with a train of curses enough to poison the light of the moon.