“Oh, hold your whisht, Stephen. Cannot you see that I’m sick with wondering why the Master’s late?”
“So will the pedlar’s girl be, if all they say be true.”
“When all they say is true, all the geese in the world will be dead—not one of ’em left to cackle. I was out in that blizzard, and ran fairish quick for shelter.”
“So did I, and was near over-blown at that.”
“And so did Master and Donald’s girl. They were prisoned for the night; but it’s only Garsykes way they think worse of them for that.”
Brant fidgetted about the kitchen, warming himself at the fire one moment, then going to the door as if he listened for some cry of trouble out of doors. “I’m not easy in mind myself,” he said at last. “Maybe I’ll step out Norbrigg way and see what’s happening to him. This gun of mine may come in useful.”
“That’s the man I thought you,” snapped Rebecca. “Bide till you’ve had a pull at the ale, then get your best foot forward.”
Hardcastle himself, an hour before, had ridden up from Norbrigg through the dusk that showed no more than a glimpse of the track ahead. It was only when he came through Weathersett village, perched high on top of the rise, that he rode into keen frosty moonlight. His glance roved over the broken lands, the grey roads that wound across them. The waiting time at Logie, for what Garsykes spite could do to him, seemed far-off. He was not between house-walls now, but in the open.
Tang of the frosty wind, smell of the uplands, got into his blood. He plucked his horse to a canter, then checked him as they went by the pinfold where he had answered three men’s call for tribute. Again he looked out across the moonlit wastes, and down at the hollow where Garsykes village lurked. If the Lost Folk needed him, he was here, and glad of any onset after the quiet of these last days.
No onset came. The moonlight showed him only a grey-blue land of sleeping pastures, a glint of white where snow-drifts, still unmelted, hugged the walls. He felt thwarted of his due, somehow, and it seemed hard to get safe home again and wait for whatever devilry Garsykes had in mind. Then his mind yielded to the night’s persuasion as his horse trotted forward soberly between the heather and the pines.