Front and rear the Ratcliffes were taken. Confused, hard pressed on every side, their blows grew wilder and more flurried. But still they held to it, and Wayne's four brothers had cause to thank the hard, monotonous hours they had spent in learning tricks of fence.
All was changed on the sudden. There had been quick breathing of striving swordsmen, and quiet, deep breaths of silent watchers—a quiet which Hiram Hey's conflict at the far side of the pinfold had scarce ruffled. But now it seemed as if Bedlam had let loose a second strife of tongues. The farm-men, maddened by the sight of blows, ran in at one another and fought for Wildwater or for Marsh. The dogs played Merry-Andrew with the sheep, and scattered them wide across the moor, and still pursued them. Cries of men, bleating of bewildered ewes, wild barking of dogs a-holydaying—and then, clear above all, Griff's shrill cry, "They flee, they free!"—and after that three flying horsemen steering a zig-zag course through sheep and dogs and wrestling farm-folk.
And over all was the splendour of the mid-day sun, the wind among the ling, the deep, unalterable silence that lies forever at the moor's heart, whether men live or die, whether they fight or drink in peace together. Only the plover heeded the swift fight, and screamed their plaudits to the victors.
CHAPTER XX
HOW THEY WAITED AT THE BOUNDARY-STONE
Red Ratcliffe, and the two who had come through the fight with him, checked their headlong gallop when at last the pursuit died far in their wake. Their shoulders were bunched forward, their heads downcast; and not till the surly pile of Wildwater showed half a league from them across the moor did they break silence.
"There'll be a queer welcome for us from the Lean Man," said one.
"Ay, he'll shake off his palsy when we come to him with the tale of four men left behind us," answered Red Ratcliffe gloomily. "Lord, how his lip will curl! And his eyes will prick one like a sword-point, cold and bright and grey. And he'll flay our tempers raw with gibes."
"Still, there's but one of the four killed outright; and when those boggart-shielded Waynes have left, we can return to help the wounded. They'll not butcher them, think'st thou?"
"Nay," sneered the third; "'tis part of their foul pride to play the woman after victory. Like as not they'll set them on some grassy hillock, with a wall to shield the sun from them, and give them drink, and nurse them into health against the next fight."