"To horse, madam, if you would still ride with us!" he cried. "I have some thirty miles or so to go to-night!"
And he strode past her, and out after Kit Bottle.
"'Tis Barnet's men, methinks, by the sound of the horses yonder," said Anthony, composedly, pointing southward, as Hal rose into the saddle.
Hal looked back toward the open door of the inn. In a moment Anne came out with Francis, who ran at once to the shed wherein her horses were.
In the doorway between parlor and passage she had undergone a moment of sickening chagrin. Not only had she failed ridiculously a second time, but she must now abandon her clutch upon her enemy, or face with him that thirty miles of night ride in biting weather! Francis looked at her for commands. She tightened her lips again, imitated Hal's own motion of casting away lassitude, drew her cloak close around her, put up her hood, and hastened out to the windy night.
Hal made great stir with his horses before moving off, that the inn people might be awakened and some of them note which road he took. This precaution, used for the benefit of Roger Barnet, gave Anne time to join Hal's party.
When the pursuivant and his fellows rode up, soon afterward, on half dead horses, that stumbled before the inn, the fugitives were well forward on the Nottingham road. It was a bitter, black night.
"Fellow travellers still!" quoth Master Marryott, to the dark figure that rode galloping, with flying cloak, beside him.
"And shall be till I see you caught, though I must ride sleepless till I drop!" was the reply.