“By God, he’s got the thing itself. Robbed, as I’m a sinner!”
Now the disturbance in the night stood out clear in his memory, but he wasted not a thought over it. In upon the astonished hostler he swept.
“Never mind the saddle, fellow. Spring up behind me and show me the road to Broughton. Up, I say, the horse can carry a dozen like us. Here are two gold pieces for you; guidance and a still tongue in your head is what I want.”
Armstrong grasped the two pistols from the holsters, flung the hesitating hostler upon the animal’s back, and leaped up in front of him.
“Which way, which way, which way?”
“Straight down the street, sir,” gasped the terrified man, clasping the rider round the waist. “Now to the right, sir, and next to the left. That’s it, sir. Up the hill. Ah, there’s your man, jogging on ahead, leisurely enough, if it’s him you seek.”
“Right! Slip off; I can ’t stop. God be with you!”
The hostler rolled in a heap along the ditch, staggered to his feet, feeling his limbs for broken bones, thinking his gold pieces hardly earned in such usage; then, satisfying himself that the damage was not great, hobbled back to Banbury.
De Courcy, riding easily, as the man had said, wholly unsuspicious of pursuit or any reason for it, had disappeared into a hollow when Bruce, like a thunder-cloud, came over the crest, and charged down upon him with the irresistible force of a troop of dragoons. The Frenchman, hearing too late the rumble of the hoofs, partly turned his horse across the road, the worst movement he could have made, for Bruce, with a war-neigh, came breast on, maddened with the delight of battle, and whirled opposing horse and rider over and over like a cart-wheel flung along the road from the hand of a smith. De Courcy lay partly stunned at the roadside, while his frightened steed staggered to its feet, leaped the hedge with a scream of fear, and scampered across the field to its farthest extremity. Armstrong swung himself to the ground with a quieting word to Bruce, who stood still, panting, and watching every movement of his master. A pistol in each hand, Armstrong strode over to his victim.
“You halter-dog, traitor, and scullion, give me the King’s commission.”