“Why, then,” said Lance, “since you are all of a mind, we will go draw the cover for the old badger; and I promise you that the Hall is not like one of your real houses of quality where the walls are as thick as whinstone-dikes, but foolish brick-work, that your pick-axes will work through as if it were cheese. Huzza once more for Peveril of the Peak! down with Bridgenorth, and all upstart cuckoldly Roundheads!”
Having indulged the throats of his followers with one buxom huzza, Lance commanded them to cease their clamours, and proceeded to conduct them, by such paths as seemed the least likely to be watched, to the courtyard of Moultrassie Hall. On the road they were joined by several stout yeoman farmers, either followers of the Peveril family, or friends to the High Church and Cavalier party; most of whom, alarmed by the news which began to fly fast through the neighbourhood, were armed with sword and pistol.
Lance Outram halted his party, at the distance, as he himself described it, of a flight-shot from the house, and advanced, alone, and in silence, to reconnoitre; and having previously commanded Ditchley and his subterranean allies to come to his assistance whenever he should whistle, he crept cautiously forward, and soon found that those whom he came to surprise, true to the discipline which had gained their party such decided superiority during the Civil War, had posted a sentinel, who paced through the courtyard, piously chanting a psalm-tune, while his arms, crossed on his bosom, supported a gun of formidable length.
“Now, a true solder,” said Lance Outram to himself, “would put a stop to thy snivelling ditty, by making a broad arrow quiver in your heart, and no great alarm given. But, dang it, I have not the right spirit for a soldier—I cannot fight a man till my blood’s up; and for shooting him from behind a wall it is cruelly like to stalking a deer. I’ll e’en face him, and try what to make of him.”
With this doughty resolution, and taking no farther care to conceal himself, he entered the courtyard boldly, and was making forward to the front door of the hall, as a matter of course. But the old Cromwellian, who was on guard, had not so learned his duty. “Who goes there?—Stand, friend—stand; or, verily, I will shoot thee to death!” were challenges which followed each other quick, the last being enforced by the levelling and presenting the said long-barrelled gun with which he was armed.
“Why, what a murrain!” answered Lance. “Is it your fashion to go a-shooting at this time o’ night? Why, this is but a time for bat-fowling.”
“Nay, but hark thee, friend,” said the experienced sentinel, “I am none of those who do this work negligently. Thou canst not snare me with thy crafty speech, though thou wouldst make it to sound simple in mine ear. Of a verity I will shoot, unless thou tell thy name and business.”
“Name!” said Lance; “why, what a dickens should it be but Robin Round—honest Robin of Redham; and for business, an you must needs know, I come on a message from some Parliament man, up yonder at the Castle, with letters for worshipful Master Bridgenorth of Moultrassie Hall; and this be the place, as I think; though why ye be marching up and down at his door, like the sign of a Red Man, with your old firelock there, I cannot so well guess.”
“Give me the letters, my friend,” said the sentinel, to whom this explanation seemed very natural and probable, “and I will cause them forthwith to be delivered into his worship’s own hand.”
Rummaging in his pockets, as if to pull out the letters which never existed, Master Lance approached within the sentinel’s piece, and, before he was aware, suddenly seized him by the collar, whistled sharp and shrill, and exerting his skill as a wrestler, for which he had been distinguished in his youth, he stretched his antagonist on his back—the musket for which they struggled going off in the fall.