"Keep a good watch, my boys," he said, after musing for a moment or two on the answers he received; "keep a good watch. There is danger stirring abroad; and I fear that we shall be obliged to lift our tents, and quit this pleasant nook."
"The sooner we quit it the better, I say," cried the beldam who had been tending the pot. "What the devil we do here at all, I don't know. Why, we are wellnigh four miles from a farm yard, and five from the village; and how you expect us to get food I don't understand."
"Are there not plenty of rabbits and hares in the wood?" said the other, in reply; "I saw at least a hundred run as I crossed just now."
"But one cannot eat brown meat for ever," rejoined the dame; "and tiny Dick was obliged to go five miles for the turkey in the pot; and then had very near been caught in nimming it off the edge of the common."
"Well, give me the brown meat for my share," answered Pharold; "I will eat none of the white things that they have fattened and fed up with their hoarded corn, and have watched early and late, like a sick child. Give me the free beast that runs wild, and by nature's law belongs to no one but him who catches it."
"No, no, Pharold, you must have your share of turkey too," cried the old lady; for although it may appear strange, yet as there is honour among thieves, so there may be sometimes that sort of generosity among gipsies which led the good dame who, on the present occasion, presided over the pot--though, to judge by her size and proportions, and to gauge her appetite by the Lavater standard of her mouth, she could have eaten the whole turkey of which she spoke herself--which led her, I say, to press Pharold to his food with hospitable care, declaring that he was a "king of a fellow, though somewhat whimsical."
The gipsies now drew round their fire, and scouts being thrown out on either side to guard against interruption, the pot was unswung from the cross bars that sustained it, trenchers and knives were produced, and, with nature's green robe for a table-cloth, a plentiful supper of manifold good things was spread before the race of wanderers. Nor was the meal unjoyous, nor were their figures--at all times picturesque--without an appearance of loftier beauty and more symmetrical grace, as, reclining on triclinia of nature's providing, with the fire and the evening twilight casting strange lights upon them, they fell into those free and easy attitudes which none but the children of wild activity can assume. The women of the party had all come forth from their huts, and among them were two or three lovely creatures as any race ever produced, from the chosen Hebrew to the beauty-dreaming Greek. In truth, there seemed more women than men of the tribe, and there certainly were more children than either; but due subordination was not wanting; and the urchins who were ranged behind the backs of the rest, though they wanted not sufficient food, intruded not upon the circle of their elders.
Scarcely, however, had the first mouthfuls been swallowed, and the cup passed its round, when the farthest scout--a boy of about twelve years of age--ran in, and whispered the mystical words, "A horse's feet!"
"One--or more than one?" was the instant question of Pharold, while his companions busied themselves in shovelling away the principal portions of their supper, and leaving nothing but what might pass for very frugal fare indeed. "Only one!" replied the boy, running back to his post; and the next instant another report was made to the effect, that a single horseman was coming up the road at full speed, together with such personal marks and appearances as the dim obscurity of the hour permitted the scouts to observe. All this, be it remarked, was carried on with both speed and quietude. The motions of the scouts were all as stealthy as those of a cat over a dewy green, and their words were all whispered; but their steps were quick, and their words were few and rapid.
The motions of the horseman, however, were not less speedy; and ere much counsel could be taken, he was upon the road, exactly abreast of the spot where the gipsies' fire was lighted. There he drew in his reins at once; and, springing to the ground, called aloud to one of the boys, who was acting sentinel, bidding him hold his horse.