The day wore by with all the unreality of a day of confusion. I was kept at work until the light was gone; then served at the Duke's table while he supped, then snatched a hurried supper while he talked with his officers. After supper, I had to go from billet to billet, looking for people whom the officers wished to see. Something very important was in the air. The discussion in the inn's great room was the first serious council of the war. About eleven o'clock, Lord Grey came out of the room, telling me to follow him. We went out into the street, where presently our men began to fall in, four or five abreast, about a hundred ranks of them. A few cavalry came, too, but not enough, I heard Lord Grey say, not enough to do any good with. In spite of all the efforts of those who loved us (by efforts I mean the robbing of farm-stables) we were very short of horses. Those which we had were not good; they were cart, not saddle-horses, unused to the noise of guns. Still, such as they were, they formed up in the street ahead of the foot. The force took a long time to form; for the men kept saying that they had forgotten something, their powder-horn, their cartridges, their guns, even. Then they had to run back to their billets to fetch whatever it was, while those who remained behind, puzzled at the movement so late at night, when they wished to sleep, began to get nervous. They began to ask where it was that we were going, was it to Axminster, or to Bridport.
CHAPTER XVII. A VOICE AT DAWN
Word was passed about that we were going to surprise the militia at Bridport at dawn. We were told to keep quiet on the march, after passing Charmouth, as the night was so still that we should be heard far off. We did not know how near the Bridport outposts might come to us under cover of the night. “You come with us, Martin,” said Lord Grey: “Take a horse. If we win Bridport you'll have to gallop back with the news.” I was made a little nervous by the thought of going into battle so soon; but gulping down my fears I mounted a marsh-mare which stood near the inn door. I hoped sincerely that no militia bullet would find any part of either of us. Then the drums began to play us out of the town with their morning roll. A fife whined out, going down to our marrows with its shrillness. Lights showed at the windows. We saw dark heads framed in yellow patches. People called to us. In the door of the great inn stood Monmouth; his face seemed very white in the glare of the torches. He raised his hand to us as we passed him. The last thing I noticed of the town, for I rode in the rear with Lord Grey, were the ranks passing the lamp on the town hall. They came up to it in waves, their cloaks showing in glimmer for an instant. Then they passed on into the night, sliding forwards slowly with a steady roll, like the moving of waves to the shore.
We were a long time riding; so long that the dawn was on us by the time we were within shot of the enemy. I don't remember very much about the ride, except that it was unreal, very unreal; for the mists came down, blotting the world from us, so that we rode in a swirl of cold grey, amid a noise of dropping. When we got to the top of the long hill after Chideock I was bidden halt at a cross-roads, with a waggon full of ammunition, while the force moved on to the attack. The hills were showing up clearly above the mist; but the valley lay like a sea, a great grey formless level, like some world of the ghosts. The troops passed down in it, moving pretty briskly, lest the mist should lift before they were in position. Most of them knew the country, so that they could well walk confidently; but their quickness had something nervous in it, as though they were ill at ease. Very soon they were out of sight, out of hearing, swallowed up in the fog.
I waited a long time (as it seemed) up there at the cross-roads. After a long wait I rode a little down the hill, from sheer anxiety. I pulled up in a bank of cloud, through which I could see dimly, in the growing light, for about a dozen yards. I was leaning well forward, listening for the sound of shooting, when something made me look down. Someone was standing at my side, slipping something into my pocket. It gave me a start. I clutched at the person. It was the old lame puppet-man who had been at Lyme the day before. “Latter for ee,” he said in a whisper. “Read en, unless you'm a fool.” His hand pressed lightly on my bridle hand for an instant; then he ducked sideways swiftly into the wilderness of ferny gorse at the side of the road, where I could not hope to follow him, even if the mist had not hidden him. Something in the voice, something in the lightness of the touch startled me into the knowledge. As he ducked, it came over me that this old man was Aurelia disguised, come to spy upon us, but bent, also, on giving me a warning, some little kind word of advice, at the beginning of my lord's war. I ought to have recognized her before. I had been blind. She had been under my eyes the whole day, yet I had never once suspected, no one, of all that army, had suspected. She had been disguised by a master-hand. She had played her part like a great actress. It was terrible to think of the risk she was running. One man's suspicion, in a time of war, would have been enough to give her to a horrible death. I tried to follow her into the jungle into which she had vanished; but my horse would not face the furze. I tried hard to see her, but it was no use; the tangle was too thick; she had gone. I called out to her softly; but I got no answer; only, at some little distance away, I heard a twig snap under a passer's foot.
In a momentary clearing of the mist, I pulled out my letter. It was written in a fine, firm hand, with signature. It was a short, purposeful letter, which kept sharply to the point. It only contained two lines. “Your Duke's cause is hopeless. He has no possible chance. Take the Axminster road to safety.” That was the whole letter. It gave me a feeling of uneasiness; but it did not tempt me to desert. I thought that if I deserted I might very well be tortured into betraying all that I knew of the Duke's plans, while I doubted very much whether the Duke's body-servant would find mercy from the merciless, frightened King. What was I to do, even if I escaped from the King's party? I was too young for any employment worthy of my station in life. I had neither the strength nor the skill for manual labour. Who would employ a boy of my age on a farm or in a factory? All that I could hope would be to get away to sea, to a life which I had already found loathsome. As to going back to my uncle's house, I doubt if I would have gone, even had I had the certainty of getting to it safely. When a boy has once taken to an adventurous life, nothing but very ill health will drive him back to home-life. Yet there was the thought of Aurelia. Somehow the thought of her was a stronger temptation than any fear of defeat. I would have liked to have seen that old enemy of mine again.
I was thinking over the letter, wondering what would come to the Duke's cause, when the valley below me began to ring with firing. A heavy fire had begun there. It thundered in a long roll, which died down, momentarily, into single sputterings through which one could hear shouting. About twenty minutes after the beginning of the shots, when all the party on the hill-top were edging nearer to the battle, taking a few steps at a time, on tenter-hooks to be engaged, we heard a great gallop of horses' hoofs coming to us at full tilt. At first we were scared by this, for the noise was tremendous, too great, we inexperienced soldiers thought, to be caused by our little troop of cavalry. We thought that it was the Bridport militia charging down on us, after destroying our friends. The mist by this time was all blowing clear, though wisps of it clung along the hedgerows in unreal rolling folds. The day above was breaking in the sultry blue summer dimness. We could see, I suppose, for a quarter of a mile, straight down the road.
We had swung round, facing towards Lyme, when the noise of the hoofs first came to us. When the turn of the road showed us a squad of cavalry coming to us at the charge, led by half a dozen riderless horses, we waited for no more. We spurred up our nags in a panic, till we, too, were going full tilt for Lyme, shouting out as we went any nonsense which came to our heads. We were in a panic fear; I believe that the horses in some way felt it too. We galloped back to Chideock as though we were chased by witches, while the gun-firing at Bridport steadily grew less, till at last it stopped altogether. At Chideock, some of the cavalry came up with us. They were our own men, our own troop of horse, not an enemy after all. The riderless horses were a few of the militia charges which had been seized from a cavalry outpost to the west of the town. We had bolted from our own crazy terror. But we were not the only fleers. Our cavalry had bolted first, at the first volley outside the town. It is unjust to say that they were afraid. Lord Grey was not a coward; our men had stout hearts enough; but they had not reckoned on the horses. The first discharge of guns scared the horses almost frantic. They swung about out of action in a couple of seconds. Another volley made them all bolt. It was when they were bolting that the men began to grow alarmed. Fear is a contagious thing; it seems to pass from spirit to spirit, like a flame along a powder train, till perhaps a whole army feels it. Our horsemen pulled up among us in Chideock in as bad a scare as you ever saw; it was twenty minutes before they dared walk back to find out what had happened to the foot at Bridport, after their retreat.
Our foot came back very angry with the horse. They had fired away a lot of powder to very little purpose, before orders reached them, bidding them retire. They had not wished to retire; but at last they had done so sullenly, vowing to duck Lord Grey for deserting them. We had taken about a dozen horses without harness, instead of the two hundred equipped chargers which we had promised ourselves.