It was not his business to see where the outposts were, but it seemed to come natural to him to note their positions.
“I might have to place men myself, some day,” he said; “and it’s as well to know.”
“Yes; there he is,” he muttered, as he caught sight of another and then of another far away, but forming links of a chain of men round the camp, well within touch of each other, and all ready to gallop at the first alarm.
“There ought to be one out here,” said Fred, at last, just as he was nearing the Manor; and for the moment he was ready to pass him over, and think of nothing but those whom he had come to see, but discipline mastered.
The spot he was approaching was a little eminence, which commanded a deep valley or coombe, that went winding and zigzagging for miles, and here he looked in vain for the outpost.
“Strange!” thought Fred; and he rode on a little further, till he was nearly to the top of the eminence, when his heart leaped, and by instinct he clapped his hand to his sword. For there, with lowered head, cropping the sweet short grass among the furze and heath, was the outpost’s horse; and this, to Fred’s experienced eye, meant the rider shot down at his post.
Half dreaming a similar fate, he looked sharply round, and then uttered an angry exclamation, as he touched his horse’s flanks, and rode forward to where the man lay between two great bushes.
But not wounded. The secret of his fall was by his side. By some means he had contrived to get a large flask of wine up at the Hall, and the vessel lay by him empty, while he was sound asleep.
“You scoundrel!” cried Fred, closing up and bending down to take hold of the man’s piece, where it stood leaning against a bush.
As he raised it, a distant flash caught his eye, and there, winding slowly and cautiously along the bottom of the coombe, with advanced guards, came a strong body of horsemen, whose felt hats and feathers here and there told only too plainly that they belonged to the Cavaliers.