“Get your musket in order, Peter,” says she in a loud voice. Whereupon the long-faced man uttered a deep groan and hastened back to the stable, holding his flag above his head. Mistress Alison turned away without a word, and I was following her when John Stirk stopped me.
“Master Dick,” says he, “there’s a thought strikes me that’s worth meditating upon. They’re all in the stable now, and there is but one door through which they can come, and this window commands it. Why should they be allowed to come through that door, Master Dick? Why,” says he, “shouldn’t they have a taste of besiegement?”
“Faith!” says I, “a rare notion, John. Why did it not strike me before? However——”
“Humphrey and me,” says he, “posted at this, window will stop any of them from coming through yonder door.”
“And so you shall,” I says, and gave the necessary orders, transferring Peter and Benjamin from the window where we stood to John and Humphrey’s old post over the garden door. And since we now knew with certainty where all our enemies lay concealed, I withdrew Gregory and Jasper from the courtyard windows and bade them take the rest of which, being oldish men, they were somewhat sore in need. This done, I went back to John and Humphrey, and waited the next move of the game.
Now, after Merciful Wiggleskirk had returned to the stable there was for some time no sign of any action on the part of the enemy, both halves of the door being shut to behind him. But at the end of an hour, the upper half was swung open, and Jack Bargery’s head and shoulders appeared. He was evidently in dispute with those inside, for he appeared to be talking in a loud voice, and shook his head fiercely as he fumbled at the latch of the lower half of the door. “There would be little loss to anybody if a bullet found its billet in his ugly carcase,” says I. “Fire, Humphrey.”
“With good will,” says he, and pulled the trigger.
The fellow at the stable door staggered and clapped his hand to his shoulder. “Three inches too high,” says Humphrey musingly, and began to reload his piece. “First blood to us, anyway,” says John, “and ’twill read them a lesson.” And so it did, for none of them showed so much as a nose-end at the stable door for the next six hours. Instead of being bottled ourselves we had bottled them fairly. And yet, as I knew quite well, we were enjoying but a temporary respite, for naught could be easier when the darkness came on, than for one of them to slip away to Pomfret and bring assistance from Fairfax’s camp. I marvelled more than once that they had not done this the previous night, but I suppose Anthony Dacre had considered that matters would go better for him if he conducted his operations with a small posse instead of a large one, the command of which would doubtless have been in other hands than his.
The day wore on in quietness, John and Humphrey keeping a sharp watch on the stable door. From the time that Jack Bargery had dropped back with a bullet in his shoulder until late in the afternoon there was no sign of our assailants. But as it grew dark, the top half of the door was thrown open again and the flag once more thrust out. I was on guard at the moment, the brothers being gone to the kitchen for a bite and sup, and I immediately despatched a messenger for Alison while I waved our own flag through the window. It was Merciful Wiggleskirk who once more appeared, and he came across the ford as Alison answered my summons.