Hugh Gwyeth: A Roundhead Cavalier

by Beulah Marie Dix

She was kneeling on the window-bench with her face close to his; he suddenly bent forward and kissed her. “God bless you for this, Lois,” he said.

Then he swung himself over the window ledge, and letting his weight come on his hands dropped noiselessly to the walk below. He dragged on his boots, and taking a cautious step across the flagstones slid down the terrace to the lawn. Once more he glanced back, not at Everscombe manor house, but at the opened window of the east parlor. It was too dark more than to distinguish the outline of the casement, but he knew that at the lattice Lois was still standing to wish him God speed to his father.

CHAPTER XXI
THE FATHERHOOD OF ALAN GWYETH

The sky was bluish black with heavy masses of clouds, but through a rift in the west showed a bright star, by which Hugh guessed roughly it must be within two hours of dawn. Quickening his pace to a run at that, he came into the shelter of the park, where it was all black, and he went forward blindly, with one arm thrust up to guard his face. Now and again he had through the tree-tops a distant sight of the sky, and by it took his directions; but for the most part he stumbled on haphazard, though at a brisk pace, for the night was passing rapidly. When at length he crushed his way through a thicket to the edge of the brook that marked the bounds of the park, the bright western star had sunk out of sight behind the trees.

Beyond the brook he hurried through a tract of woodland, where he bore to the southward to keep clear of the Kingsford highway and a farmstead that lay back from it. He came out in a cornfield, where the blades felt damp against his face as he forced a rustling passage through, and after that climbed over a wall into the open fields. There were no more houses to avoid before he reached the village, so with less caution he pressed on at a good jog-trot. For the night was waning, and Kingsford was still to come.

An ominous pale streak showed in the east before him as he climbed the swell of land that cut off sight of the village. Fearing lest his figure show up too distinctly against the sky line, he made for a clump of bushes at the summit, and had just got within their shadow when he caught the sound of hoof-beats. Dropping flat he dragged himself in under the bushes, where, peering out between the leaves, he saw the black bulk of a horseman ride along the slope below him. A little to Hugh’s left he pulled up and called to another rider a challenge that reached the boy’s ears quite clearly, then turned and came pacing back.

They had set a mounted guard about the town, then; and with that Hugh told himself he must slip past it and quickly, too, or the dawn would be upon him. But first he waited for the horseman’s return, to know what was the time between his passing and repassing, and while he waited he strained his eyes into the dark to get the lay of the land. At the foot of the rising ground was a hollow, he remembered, and across it, on the higher land, stood an irregular line of three cottages, beyond which ran a lane that led by the side wall of the churchyard. Very likely troops were lodged about the cottages now, perhaps even more patrols in the hollow, but all he could see was the black depths beneath him and the outline of the nearest cottage. Then he heard the sound of hoofs loud again, as once more the horseman on guard rode by below. Hugh could make out his form far too clearly; dawn was coming, and he durst stay no longer.

So soon as the man had turned and paced a rod on his journey back, Hugh crawled from beneath the bushes and, rolling noiselessly, creeping on hands and knees, made his way down the hillside. He remembered afterward the feel of the moist grass in his hands, the look of the mottled dark sky and the faint stars, and how at a distant hail in the village he pressed flat on the cold ground. But at last he crawled across a more level space he judged the bridle path, and scrambled down into the depth of the hollow, where a chilly mist set him shivering. As he lay outstretched, resting his weary arms a moment, he heard up above him the horseman ride by.

Now that he was within the lines of the patrol only caution and quickness were necessary. Still on hands and knees, he dragged himself slowly up the hillside, bearing ever to the south to get behind the cottages, yet not daring to venture too far, lest he come upon another line of guards. As he approached the first cottage he rose half erect and tried a short run, but the bark of a dog made him drop flat in the grass, where he lay trembling. Next instant, realizing that it was better to push on, whatever befell, he sprang up and made a dash to the cover of a hedge behind the second cottage. For now the protection of the night had nearly left him; he could see clearly the lattices of the cottage, the whitish line of highway beyond it, and others might see him as well. But as he crept forward, keeping to the shelter of the hedge, he looked up, and against the gray sky saw what gave him courage. Above the farther cottage rose the church tower, and from it stood up a staff on which fluttered a red flag with a splotch of gold upon it; Captain Gwyeth and his men still were holding out.

With renewed hope Hugh worked his way past the hedge to the shelter of an outbuilding, not a rod from the lane that ran white beneath the lich wall. He could see the church clearly now, the scowling small windows, the close side door, and the gravestones on the slope below. There was little prospect of welcome, he was reckoning anxiously, as he lay crouched against the outbuilding, when suddenly he heard a cry: “Stand, there!” Off to his right in the lane he beheld a Roundhead sentinel halted with his piece levelled.