"My young Lord of Wartmont," said Gay, "I had verily thought to go and see thee this day. Knowest thou not that Clod of Lee, the Club of Devon, hath been heard from this side the Avon? He was one of Mortimer's men, and he hateth thee and thine. He is a wolf's head, by all law. He and his outlaws would find at Wartmont much that such as they would seek. Go in haste and hold thy tower against them, if thou canst, and bother not thyself with a free hunt and a nag-load of venison."
"Thou art no king's forester," added Ben of Coventry. "These are times when a man may let well enough alone."
"He speaketh truly," whispered Richard's mailed adviser. "Ride we to the castle as fast as we may. Thy mother——"
"Not a dozen swordsmen are at the Mount!" exclaimed Richard. "My mother is unprotected! Guy the Bow, I thank thee for thy warning. What care I for a few deer? Only, watch thou and thy men; for the earl sendeth soon to put this part of the shire under close forest law. None may escape if work like this go on then."
"Thou art right, my young lord," responded Guy; "but the yeomen of Longwood have no fellowship with the wolves of Devon and Cornwall. It is said, too, that there be savage Welsh among these outlaws that spare neither woman nor child. Ride thou with speed, and God be with thee! Well for thee that they are not bowmen, like thy neighbors."
"Haste, my lord!" cried another of Richard's men. "There are many women and there are children at the tower."
"On! on!" shouted Richard; but his face was white, as he wheeled his horse southward.
Very terrible was the name which had been won by some of the robber bands of England. They had been more numerous during the reign of Edward the Second. His son, Edward the Third, was only fourteen years of age when he was crowned, and it was several years more before he really became king. Ever since then he had striven with only moderate success to restore order throughout his realm. Several notable bodies of savage marauders were still to be heard from only too frequently, while in many districts the yeomen paid as little attention to the forest laws as if they had been Robin Hood's merry men of Sherwood. This was not the case upon the lands of the great barons, but only where there was no armed force at hand to protect the game. The poachers were all the safer everywhere because of the strong popular feeling in their favor, and because any informer who should give the life of a man for that of a deer might thenceforth be careful how he ventured far into the woods. He was a mark for an arrow from a bush, and not many cared to risk the vengeance of the woodsmen.
On rode the young Neville and his four men-at-arms; but hardly had they disappeared among the forest glades before Ben of Coventry turned upon his galloway to ask:
"Guy the Bow, what thinkest thou? The Wartmont boy spoke not unkindly. There be kith and kin of the forest men at the tower. What if the Club of Lee should reach the moat and find the gate open? 'Tis a careless time."