Forest Days: A Romance of Old Times

by G. P. R. James

  CHAPTER XIII.

  As unpleasant a moment as any in the ordinary course of life is when aconversation with the being we love best--one of the few sweetentrancing resting-places of the heart which fate sometimes affords usin the midst of the ocean of cares, anxieties, sorrows, and trifles,that surrounds us on every side--is interrupted suddenly by some one towhom we are wholly indifferent.

  The step upon the stairs, and the knock that followed it at the door,were amongst the most ungrateful sounds that could have struck the earof Hugh de Monthermer and Lucy de Ashby; and there was no slightimpatience in the tone of the former, as he said, "Come in!"

  The door opened slowly; but, instead of either of Lucy's maids orpretty Cicely, who waited upon them, the ape-like face and figure ofpoor Tangel, the dwarf, appeared, beckoning Hugh out of the room withone of his strange gestures.

  "What would you, boy?" said Hugh, without rising from his seat.

  "I would have you get upon your walking-sticks," replied Tangel, "andcome with me."

  "I must first know why," answered Hugh de Monthermer. "Go away, goodTangel; I will come presently."

  "Nay, you must come now," said the dwarf. "Robin stays for no man; andRobin and the t'other fellow sent me for him of the purfled jerkin. Hehas matter of counsel for thine ear, though well I wot that it is forall the world like sticking a flower in a cock's tail."

  "I see not the likeness, good Tangel," answered Hugh, slowly rising.

  "It will soon fall out again," said Tangel. "Counsel, I mean, Sir Manat Arms. What's the wit of giving counsel to a man in a purfled jerkin?But you must come and have it, whether you will or not."

  "It must be so, I suppose," answered Hugh. But Lucy held him for amoment by the sleeve, saying, anxiously--

  "You will come back, Hugh? You will come back?"

  "Think you that I will leave you here now, Lucy?" he asked, with asmile. "No, no, dear Lucy; as I said before, if I take you not with me,I will remain and spend my life in the forest with you."

  "Ho, ho!" cried the dwarf, as if he had made a discovery, "Ho, ho! Iwere better away, methinks."

  "We did not wish for you, good Tangel," answered Hugh, laughing. "Leadon, however. Where is your master?"

  The dwarf again made a sign, waving one of his long arms in thedirection of the stairs, and Hugh de Monthermer, after a word or twomore to Lucy de Ashby, in a lower tone, quitted the room, and followedthe boy down to the same chamber into which the Outlaw had led him onhis first arrival. It was now tenanted by two men--the bold forester,and another, who was standing with his back towards the door. At thestep of the young lord, however, the latter turned round, displayingthe face of the good franklin, Ralph Harland.

  Hugh de Monthermer started; for in the short space which had passedsince last he saw him on the village green, a change had taken place inhis countenance such as nothing but intense grief can work. Indeed,mortal sickness itself but rarely produces so rapid an alteration; helooked like one of those, whom we read of, stricken with the plague ofthe fourteenth century, where the warning sign of the coming death wasread by others in the face and eyes, before the person doomed was atall aware that the malady had even laid the lightest touch upon them.Of poor Ralph Harland, it might indeed be said, as then of thoseattacked by the pestilence, "the plague was at his heart."

  Hugh de Monthermer instantly took him by the hand, exclaiming, "GoodHeaven! Ralph, what ails thee? Thou art ill, my good friend--thou artvery ill!"

  "Sick in mind, my lord, and ill in spirit," replied Ralph Harland,gloomily, "but nothing more."

  "Nay, nay, Ralph," exclaimed Hugh de Monthermer, "you must not speak tome so coldly. We have wrestled on the turf in our boyhood, we havegalloped together through the woodland in our youth; I have eaten yourgood father's bread and drank his wine, and rested my head upon thesame pillow with yourself--and Hugh de Monthermer must have a brother'sanswer from Ralph Harland. What is it ails thee, man? On my honour andmy knighthood, if my sword, or my voice, or my power can do youservice--But I know, I know what it is," he continued, suddenlyrecollecting the events of the May-day; and though he was not fullyaware of the whole, divining more than he actually knew, by combiningone fact with another--"I remember now, Ralph; and I know what is theserpent that has stung thee. Alas, Ralph, that is a wound I have nobalm to cure!

  "There is none for it on earth," replied Ralph Harland.

  "Ay," said Robin Hood, "but though there be none to cure, there may bebalm to allay, my lord; and yours must be the hand to give it. I willtell you the truth; we hold here a certain fair young lady, whom, asyou see, we treat with all respect. You may ask, why we hold her--whywe have taken her from her friends? My lord, one of her noble house hastaken from a father's care, a child beloved as she can be; has brokenbonds asunder which united many a heart together--parent and child,lover and beloved--has made a home desolate, crushed the hopes of anhonest spirit, and made a harlot of a once innocent country girl. Thisis all bad enough, my lord; but still we seek not for revenge. All thatwe require is, the only slight reparation that can be made by man. Lether be sent back to her home--let her be given up to her father--lether not be kept awhile in gaiety and evil, and then turned an outcastupon the bitter, biting world. You, my lord, must require this at thehands of the Earl of Ashby; he only can do that which is right, and toyou we look to induce that noble lord to do justice even to us poorpeasants."

  Hugh de Monthermer paused for a moment or two in thought ere hereplied, but he then answered--"I can bear no compulsory message to theEarl, my good friend. What you have done here is but wild justice; thislady never injured you--her father never injured you. You take herunwilling from her home as a hostage for the return of one who wentwillingly where she did go--who stays willingly where she now is. Ifshe chooses to stay there, who can send her back again? I can donothing in this, so long as you keep this lady here. Indeed, I tell youfairly, as you have bound me by my honour not to mention what I haveseen, I must e'en remain here, too; for my first act as a knight and agentleman, when I am at liberty, must be to do my endeavour to set herfree."

  "And as a lover, also," added Robin Hood; "but, my lord, we will spareyou a useless trouble; for, let me tell you, that not all the men ofMonthermer, and Ashby to boot, would liberate that lady if I chose tohold her. But there is some truth in what you say; and that truthstruck me before you uttered it. It was on that account I left you anhour or two ago, and went to seek this much injured young man, toconfess to him what I am never ashamed to confess, when it is so, thatI have been rash--that I had no right to punish a fair and innocentlady for the fault of a false traitor. To-morrow morning she shallreturn under your good charge and guidance; but still, my lord, to youI look to demand of the Earl of Ashby that he compel his kinsman bothto send back that light-o'-love, Kate Greenly, to her father's house,and to make such poor reparation, in the way of her dowry to a convent,as may at least punish the beggarly knave for the wrong he hascommitted. I charge you; my lord, as a knight and gentleman, to dothis."

  "And I will do it," answered Hugh de Monthermer, "since you sowillingly set the lady free, whatever be the consequences; and to methey may be bitterer than you think. I will do what you require becausemy heart tells me it is right, and my oath of chivalry binds me toperform it."

  "Ah, my lord!" said Robin Hood, "would the nobles of Englandbut consult the dictates of the heart, and keep that heartunhardened--would they remember the oath of their chivalry, and act asthat oath requires, there would be less mourning in the land--therewould be more happiness in the cottage, and some reverence for men inhigh station."

  "You are wrong," said Hugh de Monthermer, laying his hand upon the boldforester's arm--"you are wrong, and give more way to common prejudicethan I had hoped or expected. There are amongst us, Robin, men whodisgrace the name of noble, whose foul deeds, like those of thisRichard de Ashby, carry misery into other orders, and disgrace intotheir own. But vices and follies find ready chroniclers--virtues andgoo
d actions are rarely written but in the book of Heaven. One badman's faults are remembered and talked of, and every one adds, 'He wasa noble;' but how many good deeds and kindly actions, how manyhonourable feelings and fine thoughts remain without a witness andwithout a record? Who is there that says, This good old lord visited mycottage and soothed me in sickness or in sorrow? Who is there thatsays, I love this baron, or that, because he defended me against wrong,protected me against trouble, supported me in want, cheered me inadversity? And yet there are many such. I mean not to assert that thereare not many corrupt and vicious, cruel and hard-hearted. I mean not tocontend that there are any without faults, for every man has some, bebe rich or poor. But if the merits and demerits could be fairlyweighed, I do believe that the errors of my own class would not befound greater than those of any other, only that our rank serves toraise us, as it were, on a pedestal, that malice may see all flaws, andthat envy may shoot at them."

  Robin Hood paused, with his eyes bent down upon the ground, making noreply; and Hugh de Monthermer went on a moment after, saying, "Atleast, do us justice in one point. In this age, and in others gonebefore, the nobles of England have stood forward against tyrannywherever they found it. Have they ever failed to shed their blood indefence of the rights of the people? Is it not their doing, that such athing as human bondage is disappearing from the island? We may havevassals, followers, retainers, men who are bound, for the land theyhold, to do us service in time of need, but we have no serfs, notheows, as in the olden time, and even villain tenure is passing away.Again, who is it, even at the very present time, that is callingdeputies from the ranks of the people to the high parliament of thenation; to represent the rights and interests of those classes whichhad heretofore no voice in making the laws of the land? I say, it isthe nobles of England; and I am much mistaken if, in all times to come,that body of men--though there may be, and ever will be, evildoersamongst them--will not stand between the people and oppression andwrong--will not prove the great bulwark of our institutions, preservingthem from all the tempests that may assail them, let the point ofattack be where it will."

  "Perhaps it may be so," said Robin Hood; "but yet, my good lord, Icould wish that persons in high station would remember that, with theiradvantages and privileges, with wealth, power, and dignity, greaterthan their fellow-men, they have greater duties and obligationslikewise; and, as envy places them where all their faults may beobserved, it would be as well if, as a body, they were to remember thateach man who disgraces himself disgraces his whole order, and were topunish him for that crime by withdrawing from him the countenance ofthose upon whom he has brought discredit. When the virtuous associatewith the vicious, they make the fault their own; and no wonder that menof high birth, though good men in themselves, are classed together withthe wicked of their own order when they tolerate the evildoer, andleave him unpunished even by a frown."

  "I cannot but agree with you," said Hugh de Monthermer; "but----"

  "Ay, my lord, there is many a but," replied the bold outlaw, afterhaving waited for a moment to hear the conclusion of the young lord'ssentence; "and there ever will be a but, so long as men are men, andhave human passions and human follies. There was but one in whose lifethere was no _but_, and Him they nailed upon a tree;" and the outlawraised his hand, and touched his bonnet, reverently, for he felt deepreverence, however much his words might seem to want it.

  Hugh de Monthermer was not inclined to pursue the conversation anyfarther, and, turning to the young franklin, he said, "I fear, Ralph,that after all the wrong you have suffered from one of my class, youwill not be inclined to allow us much merit in any respect; but,believe me, we are not all like him."

  "I know it, my lord--I know it," replied Ralph. "If I were ignorantthat, as well as the blackest vices which can degrade man, there are tobe found in your order the brightest virtues, I should not merit tohave known you.--But in good sooth, my lord, my thoughts are not ofgeneral subjects just now. One private grief presses on me so hard thatI can think of nothing else."

  "I would fain have you wean yourself from those remembrances," said hisfriend. "Nay, shake not your head, I know that it can only be done bybanishing all those sights and sounds that are the watchwords ofmemory, and by seeking other matter for thought. Ay, even matter thatwill force your mind away from the subject that it clings to, andoccupy you whether you will or not. There are stirring times before us,Ralph,--times when the great interests of the state,--when dangers toour liberties and rights may well divide men's attention with privategriefs. What say you; will you come with me to the west, and take apart in the struggle that I see approaching?"

  "I will follow you right willingly, my lord," replied Ralph Harland,"though I cannot well go with you. I must not forget, in my selfishsorrow, that I have a father who loves me; and whose life and happinessrests upon mine, as I have seen an old wall held up by the ivy which itfirst raised from the ground. I must speak with him before I go--mustbid him adieu, and do what I can to comfort and console him. He willnot seek to make me stay, and I will soon follow you; but it shall notbe alone, for I can bring you many a heart right willing to fight underthe same banner with yourself. Where shall I find you, my good lord?"

  "As soon as I have taken this fair lady's orders," said Hugh deMonthermer, "and conducted her whither she is pleased to go, I shallturn my steps direct to Hereford by the way of Gloucester, hoping toovertake my uncle and the good Earl of Ashby, and should I find withhim his cousin Richard, he shall render to me no light account of morethan one base act."

  "Nay, my lord, nay," replied the young franklin, "I do beseech you,quarrel not for me. I know, or at least guess, what dear interests youmay peril. But, moreover, though I be neither knight nor noble, thereare some wrongs that set aside all vain distinctions, and I do notdespair of the time coming when I shall find that base traitor alone togive me an answer. When that moment arrives, it will be a solemn one;but I would not part with the hope thereof for a king's crown. But now,my lord, let me not keep you from the lady of your love. Go to her; lether know she is free to come and go, as far as I at least am concerned;but tell her, my lord, I charge you, why she was brought here, that shemay be aware of what a serpent her father and her brother cherish."

  "Ay, tell her--tell her," said Robin Hood--"tell her, for her own sake;for there is something that makes me fear--I know not why--that the daywill come when that knowledge may be to her a safeguard and a shieldagainst one who now seems powerless. Scoff not at it, my lord, as if hewere too pitiful to give cause for alarm. The scorpion is a small,petty-looking insect, but yet there is death in his sting. And now,good night; when you have spent another hour in the sweet dreams thatlovers like, betake you to repose, and early to-morrow you shall havesome one to guide you on your way."