“So you would have me spare my galloper also? Well, tomorrow’s march is like to be a straightforward matter, not a difficult bit of manoeuvring like to-day. Rejoin the regiment to-morrow evening at Tewkesbury, and in the interval do what you can for Major Locke.”
“We must leave our horses in Gloucester until we return with Mistress Helena,” said Gabriel. “They are hackneyed out with all the work they have had.”
“True. Latimer was sore spent,” said Joscelyn Heyworth. “I will send my man Moirison to hire fresh horses, and by-the-bye, Major, I think we shall do well to take him with us, he is a shrewd fellow, and three horsemen will make a better escort for your daughter.”
“Well, gentlemen, I can only accept your help very gratefully,” said Major Locke. “To have my little Nell safely sheltered in Gloucester will ease my mind greatly. While you see to the horses, I will write her a letter telling her what I would have her do.”
“I would have spared you if I could rightly have done so, Major,” said Waller, pausing with his hand on the door. “But a man who has been through the German wars is worth his weight in gold, and I am bound to think first of the public weal.”
CHAPTER XIII
“But I am ty’d to very thee
By ev’ry thought I have;