Chapter XXIII

We must go back for a few hours. The sky was without a star, and a dull heavy darkness brooded over the face of the earth, as a strong party of horsemen--whose numbers and appearance might well banish all fears, and laugh to scorn all the tales of highwaymen and footpads with which the county of ---- then rang, took its way down the road which first led from the county town towards Danemore Castle, and thence passing under the walls of the park, proceeded to the little borough of Moorhurst.

The part of the road on which they were at the moment when we must first speak of them, passed between two high banks of sand rock, overtopped with trees and shrubs, so that if there had been any light in the sky it would have been shut out from that spot; and the person who rode at their head, and seemed to act as their leader, chose the gloomiest point for the purpose of causing the line to halt, and speaking a few words in a low tone to each of his companions. They answered in a whisper, as if the deep darkness and silence around had its usual effect in producing awe; and when each had listened and replied, their leader once more advanced to the front, and they recommenced their journey two and two. Descending slowly from the moors, they emerged into a more open country; and any one who had been by the side of the road might have counted their number as eleven, notwithstanding the darkness of the night, and might also have observed that, generally speaking, they were tall and powerful men, and sat their horses with a degree of ease and composure only to be acquired by long acquaintance with the saddle.

We have remarked before, that the country in that district is famous for little greens of an acre or two in extent, generally shaded by some tall elms, and often adorned by a bright gleaming pond. To one of these the party that we speak of had advanced; and though there was a cottage at the further side of the green, all was silent and still, when the word to halt was suddenly given, and the voice of the leader was heard in a low tone, saying, "Spread out to the right and left, under the trees. I hear a horse's feet!"

The evolution that he commanded was executed in a moment, with the most profound silence, each horseman separating from his neighbour and taking ground some yards to the right and left, without any of that pawing and prancing which give pomp and circumstance to many a military man[oe]uvre. The proceedings of the leader himself, however, were even more remarkable; for, advancing perhaps twenty yards before the rest, he also quitted the road for the green turf, and then his dim figure was seen to dismount. The next moment, horse and man seemed to sink slowly down into the earth, and nothing but what appeared to be a small rise in the ground was seen through the darkness, marking the spot where they had stood.

While all this was taking place, the sound of a horse's feet beating the road with a quick trot was heard advancing from that side towards which the party had been going, and after a pause of about two minutes, a white horse, bearing his rider at a rapid rate, could be discerned entering upon the green. The horseman advanced some way, unconscious of the neighbourhood of so many others, but apparently not quite insensible to fear, as from time to time his head was turned to either side; and at length it would seem that he caught a glance of something unusual beneath the elm trees, for he suddenly pulled up his horse, and gazed anxiously into the gloom before him.

His eyes were keen, having been for some time habituated to the darkness; and becoming convinced that there was a considerable party assembled on either side, he was turning his bridle to gallop off on the same road by which he came, when suddenly what he had passed as a mere mound of earth and bushes started up into life, and his retreat was cut off by a man springing upon a horse which rose as if magically from the ground, and darting into the road before him.

"Stop!" cried a stern voice, while the gleam of something like a pistol in the hand of his opponent made the rider of the white horse recoil. He looked round, however, to see if there were no means of evading obedience to the command he had received; but by this time he found that he was surrounded, and that the way even to the low cottage by the side of the common was cut off. At the same time the command was repeated, "Stop, and give an account of yourself!"

The additional injunction, however, of "Give an account of yourself!" was rather satisfactory to the rider, who perceived therein a sort of police tone, rather than that generally employed by the worthies whom he most apprehended, and who to the word "stop!" usually added, "deliver!"

He replied, then, with a greater degree of confidence, saying, "I am a servant of the noble Earl of Danemore, and I am riding to the town of ----, by his orders, on particular business."

"Show me the badge upon your arm!" said the person who had first spoken; but the servant was obliged to acknowledge that he had come away in haste, and had not his livery coat on.

"You have some cords," said the same voice, addressing one of the other horsemen. "Tie him, and bring him along."

In a moment the unfortunate groom found himself seized, and his arms pinioned behind his back, while a still more disagreeable operation, that of tying his feet and legs tight to the stirrups, was performed by another of his captors, who dismounted for the purpose.

Not a word was spoken by any one but the leader of the party, and when he saw that the commands he had given were obeyed, he added, "Bring him up abreast with me?" and then riding on at the same glow pace in which they had been proceeding previous to the little episode which had taken place, he asked several questions of his captive in a low voice.

"We shall soon see," said he, "whether your account of yourself is true or not, for we are going to the Castle. Now tell me, how long do you say you have left it?"

"About half an hour, sir," replied the man, resuming a certain degree of courage on finding that he was not injured; "about half an hour, sir; and I can tell you that my lord will be mighty angry when he finds you have stopped me, and brought me back. He will make the house too hot to hold you, and the county too, that I'll warrant. You don't know whom you have got to deal with. He suffers no one to do anything but what he likes."

"Is the Earl of Danemore still up?" demanded the stranger, calmly, taking not the slightest heed of the other's intimation.

"Yes, that he is, and will not be in bed for these two hours, as you will find to your cost, perhaps, when he hears you have stopped me," answered the groom, firmly believing that what was awful to him must be equally so to every one else.

"Does he not usually go to rest sooner?" asked the stranger again. "I understood that the whole household were required to be in bed by eleven, and I was afraid that we might have to rouse the porter to give us admittance."

"Ay, he generally does go to bed at eleven," answered the groom, "but he has not done so to-night. You will have to rouse the porter, however, and most of the other servants too; for old John came out, growling and swearing at me, in his shirt, when I made him open the gates."

"He must not swear at us, though," replied the other quietly, but in a tone which moved the groom's astonishment even more than anything which had passed before, so little reverence did his captors show either for the awful name of the Earl of Danemore or any of his dependants. As the other ceased, however, and did not resume the conversation, he had no choice but to accompany him in silence; and, followed by the rest of the party, they proceeded slowly on the road, which was evidently well known to the leader, now winding in and out amongst the high banks and woods, now crossing scattered pieces of the heath and moor-land, till at length they arrived at that spot under the walls of the park where, as we have mentioned in describing the forced journey of Langford, Danemore Castle, with its wide extent of park and woods, became first visible to the eye of any one travelling on the road from Moorhurst to the county town.

There the leader of the party halted, and suffering his hands to drop thoughtfully upon the saddle-bow, he gazed up towards the spot where the Castle stood. At that dark hour, however, nothing was to be perceived but the masses of tall trees with which the building itself was confounded in undistinguished shade, except, indeed where a single spot of light was seen gleaming like a beacon, marking that there was the habitation of some human beings amongst the dark and awful-looking blackness which the scene otherwise presented.

After thus gazing for a few minutes, the leader of the party turned towards the groom, and while he reined back his horse to the other side of the road, said, with something of a sneer, "We will save old John the porter the trouble of opening the gate for us." At the same moment, the well-trained horse which he rode, feeling a touch of the spur, started forward towards the wall, cleared it with ease, and horse and rider stood within the boundaries of the park.

"I can't leap with my hands and legs tied!" cried the groom, whose first feelings were those of an equestrian; "that's impossible; I shall break my own neck and the horse's knees."

"You shan't be required to leap," was the reply of the leader, from the other side of the wall; and then, turning towards one of his companions, he added, "You must manage to pull it down, Harvey."

"I will leap it first, however!" replied his companion, and away went a second horse and man over the wall. No sooner was this done than several of the other horsemen dismounted, and with short bars of iron, which each of them appeared to have slung at their saddle-bow, they set to work upon the wall of the park, and in less than a quarter of an hour the space of three yards was laid level between the road and the park.

The whole of the troop then passed in, taking the groom along with them; and, riding slowly up to a clump of old chestnuts at the distance of about three hundred yards from the terrace on which the mansion stood, they gathered themselves together in a group under the boughs, and their leader, advancing a few steps, again gazed steadfastly upon the Castle, whose towers and pinnacles were now to be more clearly distinguished rising here and there above the trees, and marking, with the straight lines of the older architecture, or the light tracery of the more modern and ornamental parts, the sky beyond, over which a pale gleam cast by the rising moon was just beginning to spread itself.

Gradually, as he sat there on horseback, the beautiful orb of night rose up from behind the trees, and with her peculiar power of dispersing the clouds and shadows that obstruct her way, she was seen struggling with and overcoming the vapours of the night; sometimes, like a veiled but still lovely countenance, beaming through a thin film of white mist which grew radiant with her radiance; sometimes hidden for a single instant behind a dark mass which swept over her with gilded edges; sometimes bursting forth from a dark cloud, with pure effulgence, like sudden joy succeeding despair.

As he sat there, with the varying light of the moon falling upon him, now casting his long shadow upon the soft green turf of the park, now leaving him distinct, and as it were magnified by the dim misty light, the powerful form of that horseman was scanned eagerly and apprehensively by the groom, on whose mind but little doubt remained in regard to the character and propensities of the party whose unwilling companion he had become, he thought he had never seen a more powerful frame, and in so thinking he was right; but the imagination of terror had had a great deal to do with the business, when he called him in his heart "the most ruffian-like fellow that his eyes had ever rested on."

After about ten minutes' contemplation, during which not a word was spoken by any one, and not a sound was heard but the low sighing of the wind through the neighbouring trees, and the scream of the screech owls which nested themselves in the old ivy of the Castle, the leader returned to his party, saying, "I would fain have that light put out first; but, however, we cannot stay wasting all our time here. Now, my good fellow," he continued, turning to the groom, "I want one or two pieces of information from you; but before you answer, you had better take into consideration that you are speaking to a person not willing to be trifled with; that if you do not answer straightforwardly and at once, your life is not worth five minutes' purchase; and that if you give me false information you will be as surely a dead man within two hours as you are now a living one. In the first place, then, inform me, in what part of the house do the servants sleep?"

"Why, up at the top, to the westward," replied the man; "that is where the serving men sleep; but there are others, such as the sewers, and the grooms of the chambers, who sleep at the top of Hubert's Tower. Then there's my lord's own man sleeps in his ante-room; but to-night there are two or three who were ordered to stay in the outer room where the prisoner is, in the old tower; that is to say, in what they used to call the haunted rooms, for they were always shut up, and nobody went in but my lord and Mistress Bertha, so that folks said that the ghost of the Countess used to walk there."

"So there are three men appointed to sleep there, are there?" demanded the other; "you are sure of the fact?"

"Why, no," replied the groom; "if you mean whether I am sure they were ordered to sleep there, I'm sure enough of that; but I am quite as sure that not one of them will do it; for I heard Will Hudson say that the Earl might skin him alive first. No, no; they'll none of them stay there after twelve o'clock at night, I'll answer for it."

"That is sufficient on that score," said the interrogator; "now tell me further, now many men in all may there be in the Castle?"

The groom paused for a moment, as if in thought, but then answered, "Some fifteen or sixteen that sleep within doors; but then there are all the grooms and horse-boys, and my lord's three coachmen, and the running footmen, who sleep at the stables, which you know lie out by----"

"I know, I know," interrupted the other. "Not more than fifteen or sixteen; fifteen or sixteen lackeys!" he continued, turning with a sort of contemptuous laugh to his companions; "it is scarcely worth while priming our pistols. Are there none of them sleep below?"

"Why, no; not by rights," replied the man, "except the porter and his boy, but to-night there will be Willy Hudson and the rest, who, I dare say, will come down into the corridor and sleep in the armchairs; and then, too, there is Fat Frank, who has got Silly John in charge, shut up in the dark room at the bottom of Hubert's Tower."

"Silly John!" exclaimed the other; "what does he do there?"

"Why, he would not tell, I hear," answered the groom, "who were the people whom he had seen bury my young lord under the beech trees by Upwater Mere, so my lord ordered him to be shut up in the dark room, without either meat or drink, till he did; and if he don't tell, hang me if he don't starve to death, for my lord's not one to go back from what he has once said."

As the man spoke, the person who had been thus questioning him moved his hand with a rapid and impatient gesture to the holster at his saddle-bow, plunged it in, and pulling out a pistol, thrust it into his belt. He muttered also a few words in a hurried tone, which could only be heard by himself; but then again, appearing to recover from some impatient feelings, he continued, "One word more, my good fellow. Is not the small wicket door, at the back of the western wing, very often, if not always, left open all night?"

The man hesitated, and showed evident signs of a disinclination to reply.

"It is, sometimes," he said at length, "but not always."

"I ask you," continued the other, "did you ever know it shut?"

"Yes, I think so. I don't know. I can't tell," replied the groom, with manifest hesitation, at what he felt to be betraying the way into his lord's mansion.

"He prevaricates," said one of the men behind; "he prevaricates; shall I blow his brains out, Captain?"

"Not yet," replied their leader, calmly. "Do you intend to answer, or not? Did you ever in your life know that door shut?"

"No. I didn't; no, I didn't," answered the groom. "It's always open; that's the truth."

"Very well, then," continued the other. "If I remember right, when one goes straight forward from that door, and then turns along the first passage to the left, it leads to the little hall, out of which a passage takes to the foot of the great stairs. Now, there are two other doors, one of which leads to the private staircase going to the Earl's apartments. Which of those two doors is it; the right or the left; for I forget? Your life is at stake," he added, in a warning tone.

There was a sound like the clicking of a pistol-lock behind him, and the man replied without the loss of a single moment, "It is the door to the left. I tell you true, upon my word."

"I dare say you do," replied the other; "if you don't, so much the worse for you. You will remain here till I come back; and you know what will happen to you if you have made any mistake in this business. Harvey, learn from him exactly the way to the room where the poor silly man has been put. You and Hardcastle must undertake to set him free; then join me with all speed at the point you know. You, Williams and Erith, stay with this man and the horses; and if you should have such reason to believe that he has told me a falsehood as to induce you to leave the spot, give him a couple of ounces of lead in his head before you go. You understand me. I know a word is sufficient with you."

"But, Captain," exclaimed the man whom he called Erith, "why should I not go with you? Curse me if I like to be left here, holding the horses like a groom. Why must not I go?"

"Because I appoint you to a post of trust and danger," answered his leader; "there is more to be apprehended from without than from within; judgment of what intelligence it may be necessary to give me, too, is wanted, and, therefore, I choose you. But to end all in one word, Erith," he added, seeing the other about to reply, "you must stay here, because I direct you to do so; I, who never yet found you unwilling to obey at once, in moments of action and peril!"

"That's the way you always come over me, Captain," replied his companion; "however, I suppose I must do as you bid me, having stood by your side in many a moment of life and death work."

"And always acted like a lion, where it was needful," answered his leader, holding out to him his hand, which the other grasped eagerly. "God bless you, Erith!" he added; "there is something tells me we shall not be long together. If we part for the last time to-night, remember that I love you, and that I think even now of the watch-fire of Kaiser-lautern, when, wounded yourself, you brought cup after cup of cold water to your wounded Captain's lips."

Thus saying he dismounted from his horse, and eight of his comrades followed his example. The well-trained beasts were then ranged in a line, and a single rope run through the bridles seemed all that was necessary to keep them together till their riders' return. One end of the rope was tied to a tree, the other to the last horse's bit; and after gazing for one moment more at the light in the window of the tower, across which a dark figure was seen to pass twice, the leader gave a signal with his hand. The whole party then began silently to descend the hill, with the exception of the two who had been appointed to remain with the horses and the unhappy groom, whose terror had now grown to such a pitch, that, had it not been for the lashings with which he was attached to his horse, he could not have sat the animal, although it remained as quiet and passive as if it had never known any other stable than that of a farmer's mule.

With eager eyes and a beating heart the man marked the party descend the hill, emerge from the shadow of the trees, cross the dewy grass, which glistened like frost-work in the full beams of the moon, ascend the opposite rise, and then take their way amongst the trees behind, towards the back of the building where they proposed to effect their entrance. It was certain that the property of his lordly master was at stake at that moment, and perhaps also the lives of several of his comrades; but yet the worthy domestic felt little or no agitation upon that score. All that affected him, all he thought of, as would too naturally be the case with most of the human worms which crawl about in this state of being, was his own situation, his own danger. He knew, he felt, that any misunderstanding of the directions he had given, or that anything going wrong in the arrangements of those who had compelled him to afford them intelligence, might be attributed to intentional falsehood or mis-statement on his part, and that a life which he valued just in proportion to its worthlessness, its inactivity, and its want of fine perceptions, might be taken from him on the slightest notice.

He regarded the party of nine, then, as they descended the hill, with feelings most strangely mingled and apparently contradictory; there was a hope for their success, which he trusted would free him from the painful situation in which they had placed him; there were sensations of dislike and enmity towards those who had stopped and made him a prisoner; there were feelings of anger in regard to the degradation of the Earl of Danemore, who had so long ruled paramount throughout the country round; and there was that longing desire which brutes as well as man feel, to witness everything of importance that is passing around them, especially when they are prevented by any cause from so doing.

His feelings, I say, were so mingled, that his whole capability of wishing was concentrated in one earnest desire to know the result, and to have, if we may use such a colloquial expression, "the matter out at once." There are times and seasons, indeed, when ten minutes of the past, ten minutes of anything that is absolutely certain, are worth whole ages of doubt, even though that doubt may not be mingled with any degree of apprehension; but in the present instance, personal terror added immensely to all that the unhappy man felt; and his thoughts of every dear relation of life which might be sacrificed, had ample room to torture his heart, while, silent and inactive, he remained upon the hill, watching the progress of those on whom depended his whole afterfate.

When they approached the side of the wood that swept round the esplanade, the straining eye of the captive could no longer distinguish them; and he waited eagerly, with his eyes fixed upon the building, as if he could gather all that was passing within those walls from the dull unmeaning face of the stone. For some time, however, neither sight nor sound gave him the slightest indications of what he longed to learn. It was like the cold outside, which we too frequently see in the world, covering a heart all agitation, anxiety, bitterness, and pain.

At length his feelings became insurmountable. There are degrees of terror which give courage: he felt that it would be a thousand times preferable to be amongst his comrades at the Castle, sharing their fate and mingling in their danger, than sitting there in perfect inactivity, waiting a result which he had no power to change; and he writhed with the bonds that confined him. As he did so, he felt that the knot upon the cords which tied his arms gave way in a slight degree--that he could loosen it still further by a great but silent exertion of his strength; and as he made that exertion, it slipped down to his wrists, over which it was easily passed.

The two men who guarded him were gazing as eagerly upon the Castle as he had been; and their minds were too full of the progress of their comrades to allow them to take any note of the slight movement he had made, so that, before they were at all aware of what he was doing, his arms were free. As silently as he could, he slipped one hand into his pocket for a knife to cut the cords which tied his legs, and he had almost accomplished that purpose also, while they still continued gazing at the Castle, along the windows of which more than one light was now gleaming. He felt that he could do no more without calling attention; but he perceived that what remained to do would be speedily done, if he could get away, and would not impede his progress as he went; and he gazed round upon the two who remained beside him, with a beating heart, longing to gallop down to the Castle as fast as he could, yet terrified at the idea of making the attempt. His hesitation was soon brought to an end, however, for, giving way to the impulse of habit, he put forward his hand, without thinking of what he was doing, and patted his horse's neck. The gesture instantly drew the attention of those beside him.

"What are you about there?" cried Erith. "He has got his hands free!"

The groom stayed to hear no more, but snatching up the bridle, he struck his horse hard and galloped down the hill. The report of a pistol rang in his ear the next moment, and at the same time a feeling as if some one had run a hot iron along his right cheek, followed by the trickling of blood, showed him that the robber's aim had not been far amiss. The slight wound only added wings to his flight, however, and the sound of a horse's feet following, urged him on still faster. It was--and he knew it--a ride for life or death; but fortunately for him his beast felt that it was speeding to its longed-for stable, and though the hoofs of the pursuer sounded close behind, the groom rather gained than lost ground in that headlong race.