"I don't think any physician will do him much good," said Humphrey, unable to resist the jest. "Your honour is scarcely likely to find him—alive, I mean—on your return."
Colonel Ashenhurst did not hear the remark. He had no suspicion whatever of the trick played him, and ordered his men to ride on, gladdening the hearts of the stalwart brothers by his departure.
"I owe my preservation to you, Jasper," said Charles, as he removed the kerchief from his brow.
"Ay, but for this stratagem your majesty might have been captured," remarked Trusty Dick. "I tremble to think of it."
"You have something more to do, Dick," said Jasper. "You must invent some probable story to account for your not delivering the prisoners at Codsall."
"True," cried Charles. "I fear you may suffer on my account."
"Think not of us," said Trusty Dick. "We must take our chance. 'Tis sufficient that your majesty has escaped."
The road to Codsall lay on the right, but Charles and his companions had no intention of taking it, even as a feint, for Colonel Ashenhurst and his troop were already out of sight. Though anticipating no further danger, they quickened their pace, and soon reached Long Birch.
The portion of the heath they now entered on was wilder than that which they had previously traversed, but there was a tolerably good road across it, and this eventually brought them to the banks of the little river Penk.
About half a mile lower down, this stream turned a mill, and the party now proceeded in that direction, it having been previously arranged that the king should dismount at Pendeford Mill, as it was called, and perform the rest of the journey on foot, and attended only by half his escort, so that his arrival at Moseley Old Hall might not be discovered.