Under the Storm

by Charlotte M. Yonge

His harvest was, however, the matter in hand, and the little patch of corn was cut and bound between him and his sisters, without further interruption. The sounds of guns had ceased early in the day, and a neighbour who had ventured down to the camp to offer some apples for sale leant over the gate to wonder at the safety of the crop, "though to be sure the soldiers were very civil, if they would let alone preaching at you;" adding that there was like to be no more fighting, for one of the gentlemen inside had ridden out with a white flag, and it was said the Prince was talking of giving in.

"Give in!" cried Emlyn setting her teeth. "Never. The Prince will soon make an end of the rebels, and then I shall ride-a-cock horse with our regiment again! I shall laugh to see the canting rogues run!"

But the first thing Steadfast heard the next day was that the royal standard had come down from the Cathedral tower. He had gone up to Elmwood to get some provisions, and Tom Oates, who spent most of his time in gazing from the steeple, assured him that if he would come up, he would see for himself that the flags were changed. Indeed some of the foot soldiers who had been quartered in the village to guard the roads had brought the certain tidings that the city had surrendered and that the malignants, as they called the Royalists, were to march out that afternoon, by the same road as that by which the parliamentary army had gone out two years before.

This would be the only chance for Emlyn to rejoin her father or to learn his fate. The little thing was wild with excitement at the news. Disdainfully she tore off what she called Rusha's Puritan rags, though as that offended maiden answered "her own were real rags in spite of all the pains Patience had taken with them. Nothing would make them tidy," and Rusha pointed to a hopeless stain and to the frayed edges past mending.

"I hate tidiness. Only Puritan rebels are tidy!"

"We are not Puritans!" cried Rusha.

Emlyn laughed. "Hark at your names," she said. "And what's that great rebel rogue of a brother of yours?"

"Oh! he is Jeph! He ran away to the wars! But Stead isn't a Puritan," cried Rusha, growing more earnest. "He always goes to church—real church down in Bristol. And poor father was churchmartin, and knew all the parson's secrets."

"Hush, Rusha," said Patience, not much liking this disclosure, however Jerusha might have come by the knowledge, "you and Emlyn don't want to quarrel when she is just going to say good-bye!"

This touched the little girls. Rusha had been much enlivened by the little fairy who had seen so much of the world, and had much more playfulness than the hard-worked little woodland maid; and Emlyn, who in spite of her airs, knew that she had been kindly treated, was drawn towards a companion of her own age, was very fond of little Ben, and still more so of Steadfast.