While he was searching he heard voices from behind him, mingled with the screaming of hawks, the yelping of dogs, and the tinkling of bells.
"Well cast off aloft, ah!—well flown!" cried one voice.
"Now she hath seized the fowl," cried another, "and 'gins to plume her—rebeck her not!—stand still and check her!"
Timothy turned quickly round. High in the air he saw a heron flying, pursued by a couple of falcons, that whirled about their quarry, shunning its spear-like beak. At a moment of advantage one of the hawks mounted yet higher, and then, swooping down, struck like a thunderbolt upon her prey and seized the fowl within her talons. A shower of feathers floated down into the midst of the joyous crowd of men and women who were watching the sport from their horses' backs in the stubble-field.
It was a very gay and courtly company. Here on their prancing horses were many elegant gentlemen wearing plumed hats and bright-coloured capes; ladies with their snow-white ruffs and their long velvet gowns that almost swept the daisies and dandelions at their horses' feet; and all were laughing and calling aloud in their excitement as they compared the merits of their birds, or made wagers on the success of their flights.
Near to where Timothy stood, an old gentleman with a pointed white beard and a russet-coloured doublet rode on a very large chestnut horse. He carried a merlin hawk perched on his fist, but he seemed to take less interest in the sport than did his younger companions. Timothy had seen him many times before, both in Plymouth and at Modbury Park, and knew him to be the great Baron Champernoun, the lord of the manor of Modbury, a noted soldier and courtier. A very beautiful lady rode by his side, wearing a sombre black gown and a wide black hat with black feathers. She looked strangely out of place among her gaily-dressed friends, and Timothy wondered why she should wear this habit of gloom, until he saw her face, when he at once recognized her as the Lady Elisabeth Oglander, and knew that her reason for shunning bright colours in her apparel was the death of her most noble husband, the honourable Edmund Oglander, who had fallen in battle in the Netherlands while fighting against the Spaniards.
She drew rein, and the master falconer approached her with his square frame round his waist, on which were perched some half-dozen hawks with their hoods and bells and their scarlet tufts. The lady leaned over on her saddle and took a hawk from the falconer's hand. The bird flapped its wings in great commotion until it was fairly perched on the fingers that held it. Then the Lady Elizabeth, holding her hand aloft, rode off across the field, followed presently by the rest of the hawking party, while Tim Trollope watched them disappear round a corner of the wood.
As he turned to continue his way he came face to face with a boy of about his own age, who was carrying some dead partridges—spoils of the chase.
"Helloh, Will!" cried Timothy, recognizing the lad. "I had thought you were at work on Modbury farm. Hast had a rise in the world that you are out here at the heels of the gentlefolks?"