"Ay," replied Humphrey. "Why, what young lord would journey about with a great dog like that in his train? If thou art to play Josceline, thou must play in earnest. Moreover, the hound would get us into trouble with half the keepers of the forest. If ever a deer were missing, would not thy dog bear the blame? So think no more of thy Fleetfoot."
Hugo was silent while the complacent Humphrey jogged on ahead of him.
What the serving-man had said was in large measure true. And he thought
with a swelling heart that it was not so easy, after all, to personate
Josceline when that personating cost him Fleetfoot.
But no less a person than William Lorimer had discovered that Fleetfoot had been left behind. William was fond of both the dog and his master; so now, when Fleetfoot made his appeal to William, the man-at-arms at once responded. He snapped the chain that bound him, and leading him by the collar to the postern gate opened it and let down the bridge. "Why, what would become of thee, Fleetfoot," he said, "when that which is to come to the castle hath come?" Then while the great deerhound looked up expectantly into his face he added as he pointed to the place where Hugo and Humphrey had entered the wood, "After thy master, Fleetfoot! Seek him!"
The deerhound is a dog of marvellous swiftness, and, like an arrow from the bow, Fleetfoot shot across the open space and gained the wood. William Lorimer looked after him. "If thy other commands be no better obeyed, Humphrey, than this which left Fleetfoot behind, I fear thou wilt have cause to lose a part of thy self-satisfaction," he said. Then he drew up the bridge and shut the postern gate.
Hugo had taken the loss of Fleetfoot so quietly that Humphrey with still greater confidence now changed the course slightly, and went down to the river-bank at a point which was half ford and half deep water. But at this Hugo was not so obedient.
"What doest thou, Humphrey?" he demanded. "Was not our course marked out toward Selby? Why wouldst thou cross the river here? We must be seen once on our road, and that thou knowest, or the king's men will not pursue us, and perchance Lady De Aldithely and Josceline shall fare the worse."
"I go not to Selby," declared Humphrey, stubbornly. "And why shouldst thou think we have not been seen? The king's men have eyes, and it was their business to watch the castle."
Then Hugo sat up very straight in his saddle and looked at Humphrey full as haughtily as Josceline himself could have done. "Thou art, for the time, my servant," he said. "And we go to Selby."
For a moment Humphrey was disconcerted, but he did not relinquish his own plan. Presently he said: "If we must go to Selby, let us cross the river here. We can go on the south side of it as well as the north."
Hugo reflected. Then without a word he directed his horse down the bank and into the water, which was here swimming deep. Well satisfied, Humphrey followed.