The first thing he did was to give thanks in heart that he had been aided thus far not to betray his trust, and then to feel that Corporal Dodd's flogging was a far severer matter than the worst chastisement he had ever received from his father, even when he kept Jeph's secret about the stolen apples. Putting on his coat was impossible, and he was so stiff and sore that he could not hope to conceal his condition from Patience.

At home all were watching for him. They ran up in anxiety, for one of the ever ready messengers of evil had rushed down the glen to tell Patience that the soldiers were beating Stead shamefully, and Jeph standing by not saying one word. Little Ben broke out with "Poor, poor!" and Rusha burst into tears at sight of the blood, while Emlyn said "Just what comes of going among the rascal Roundheads," and Patience looked up at him and said "Was it—?" he nodded, and she quietly said "I'm glad." He added, "Jeph's coming soon," and she knew that the trial was not over. The brother and sister needed very few words to understand one another, and they were afraid to say anything that the younger ones could understand. Patience washed the weals with warm water and milk, and wrapped a cloak round him, but even the next morning, he could not use his arms without fresh bleeding, and the hindrance to the work was serious. He could do nothing but herd the cattle, and he was much inclined to drive them to the further end of the moorland where Jephthah would hardly find him, but then he recollected that Patience would be left to bear the brunt of the attack, so that he would not go far off, never guessing, poor fellow, that in his dull, almost blundering fashion, he was doing like the heroes and the martyrs, but only feeling that he must keep his trust at all costs. Jeph, however, did not come that day or the next, so that inwardly, the wound-up feeling had passed into a weariness of expectation, and outwardly the stripes had healed enough for Stead to go about his work as usual only a little stiffly. He went into Bristol on market day as usual, and then it was, on his way out that Jeph joined him, saying it was to bid Patience and the little ones farewell, since the marching orders were for the morrow. He was unusually kind and good-natured; he had a load of comfits for Rusha and Ben, and a stout piece of woollen stuff for Patience which he said was such as he was told godly maidens wore, and which possibly the terror of his steel cap and corslet had cheapened at the mercer's; also he had a large packet of tractates for Stead's own reading, and he enquired whether they possessed a Bible.

Stead wondered whether all this was out of regret at the treatment he had undergone, or whether it was to put him off his guard, and this occupied him when Jeph began to preach, as he did uninterruptedly for the last mile, without any of the sense, if there were any, reaching the mind of the auditor.

They reached the hut, the gifts were displayed; and when the young ones, who were all a little afraid of the elder brother, had gone off to feast upon the sweets, Jeph began with enquiries after Steadfast's back, and he replied that it was mending fast, while Patience exclaimed at the cruelty and wickedness of so using him.

"Why wouldn't he speak then?" said Jeph. "Yea or nay would have ended it in a moment, but that's Stead's way. He looks like it now!" and he did, elbows on knees, and chin on hands.

"Come now, Stead, thou canst speak to me! Was it all because Faithful hauled thee about?"

"He did, and he had no call to," said Stead, surlily.

"Well, that's true, but I'm not hauling thee. Tell me, Stead, I mind now that thou wast out with father that last day ere the Parson was taken to receive his deserts. I don't believe that even thy churlishness would have stood such blows if thou hadst known naught of the idolatrous vessels, and couldst have saved thy skin by saying so! No answer. Why, what have these malignants done for thee that thou shouldst hold by them? Slain thy father! Burnt thine house! No fault of theirs that thou art alive this day! Canst not speak?"

Jeph's temper giving way at the provocation, he forgot his conciliatory intentions and seizing Stead by the collar shook him violently. Growler almost broke his chain with rage, Patience screamed and flew to the rescue, just as she had often done when they were all children together, and Jeph threw his brother from him so that he fell on the root of a tree, and lay for a moment or two still, then picked himself up again evidently with pain, though he answered Patience cheerfully that it was nought.

"Thou art enough to drive a man mad with thy surly silence," exclaimed Jeph, whom this tussle had rendered much more like his old self, "and after all, knowing that even though thou art not one of the holy ones, thou wilt not tell a lie, it comes to the same thing. I know thou wottest where these things are, and it is only thy sullen scruples that hinder thee from speaking. Nevertheless, I shall leave no stone unturned till I find them! For what is written 'Thou shalt break down their altars.'"

"Jeph," said Stead, firmly. "You left home because of your grief and rage at father's death. Would you have me break the solemn charge he laid on me?"

"Father was a good man after his light," said Jeph, a little staggered, "but that light was but darkness, and we to whom the day itself is vouchsafed are not bound by a charge laid on us in ignorance. Any way, he laid no bonds on me, but I must needs leave thee alone in thy foolishness of bondage! Come, Patience, wench, and aid me, I know this rock is honeycombed with caves, like a rabbit warren, no place so likely."

"I help thee—no indeed'" cried Patience. "Would I aid thee to do what would most grieve poor father, that thou once mad'st such a work about! I should be afraid of his curse."

Possibly if Jeph had not pledged himself to his comrades to overcome his brother's resistance, and bring back the treasures, he might have desisted; but what he did was to call to Rusha to bring him a lantern, and show him the holes, promising her a tester if she would. She brought the lantern, but she was a timid, little, unenterprising thing, and was mortally afraid of the caverns, a fear that Patience had thought it well not to combat. Emlyn who had already scrambled all over the face of the slope, and peeped into all, could have told him a great deal more about them; but she hated the sight of a rebel, and sat on the ground making ugly faces and throwing little stones after him whenever his back was turned.

Stead, afraid to betray by his looks of anxiety, when Jeph came near the spot, sat all the time with his elbows on his knees, and his hands over his face, fully trusting to what all had agreed at the time of the burial of the chest, that there was no sign to indicate its whereabouts.

He felt rather than saw that Jeph, after tumbling out the straw and fern that served for fodder in the lower caves, where the sheep and pigs were sheltered in winter, had scrambled up to the hermit's chapel, when suddenly there was a shout, but not at all of exultation, and down among the bushes, lantern and all came the soldier, tumbling and crashing into the midst of an enormous bramble, whence Stead pulled him out with the lantern flattened under him, and his first breathless words were—

"Beelzebub himself!" Then adding, as he stood upright, "he made full at me, and I saw his eyes glaring. I heard him groaning. It is an unholy popish place. No wonder!"

Patience and Rusha were considerably impressed, for it was astonishing to see how horribly terrified and shaken was the warrior, who had been in two pitched battles, and Ben screamed, and needed to be held in Stead's arms to console him.

Jeph had no mind to pursue his researches any further. He only tarried long enough to let Patience pick out half-a-dozen thorns from his cheeks and hands, and to declare that if he had not to march to-morrow, he should bring that singular Christian man, Captain Venn, to exorcise the haunt of Apollyon. Wherewith he bade them all farewell, with hopes that by the time he saw them again, they would have come to the knowledge of the truth.

No sooner was he out of sight among the bushes than Emlyn seized on Rusha, and whirled her round in a dance as well as her more substantial proportions would permit, while Steadfast let his countenance expand into the broad grin that he had all this time been stifling.

"What do you think it was?" asked Patience, still awestruck.

"Why—the old owl—and his own bad conscience. He might talk big, but he didn't half like going against poor father. Thank God! He has saved His own, and that's over!"



CHAPTER XV. A TABLE OF LOVE IN THE WILDERNESS.

"Yet along the Church's sky Stars are scattered, pure and high; Yet her wasted gardens bear Autumn violets, sweet and rare, Relics of a Spring-time clear, Earnests of a bright New Year." KEBLE

No more was heard or seen of Jephthah, or of Captain Venn's troop. The garrison within Bristol was small and unenterprising, and in point of fact the war was over. News travelled slowly, but Stead picked up scraps at Bristol, by which he understood that things looked very bad for the King. Moreover, Sir George Elmwood died of his wounds; poor old Lady Elmwood did not long survive him, and the estate, which had been left to her for her life, was sequestrated by the Parliament, and redeemed by the next heir after Sir George, so that there was an exchange of the Lord of the Manor. The new squire was an elderly man, hearty and good-natured, who did not seem at all disposed to interfere with any one on the estate. He was a Presbyterian, and was shocked to find that the church had been unused for three years. He had it cleaned from the accumulation of dirt and rubbish, the broken windows mended with plain glass, and the altar table put down in the nave, as it had been before Mr. Holworth's time; and he presented to the living Mr. Woodley, a scholarly-looking person, who wore a black gown and collar and bands.

The Elmwood folk were pleased to have prayers and sermon again, and Patience was glad that the children should not grow up like heathens; but her first church going did not satisfy her entirely.

"It is all strange," she said to Stead, who had stayed with the cattle. "He had no book, and it was all out of his own head, not a bit like old times."

"Of course not," said Emlyn. "He had got no surplice, and I knew him for a prick-eared Roundhead! I should have run off home if you had not held me, Patience. I'll never go there again."

"I am sure you made it a misery to me, trying to make Rusha and Ben as idle and restless as yourself," said Patience.

"They ought not to listen to a mere Roundhead sectary," said Emlyn, tossing her head. "I couldn't have borne it if I had not had the young ladies to look at. They had got silk hoods and curls and lace collars, so as it was a shame a mere Puritan should wear."

"O Emlyn, Emlyn, it is all for the outside," said Patience. "Now, I did somehow like to hear good words, though they were not like the old ones."

"Good, indeed! from a trumpery Puritan."

Stead went to church in the afternoon. He was eighteen now, and that great struggle and effort had made him more of a man. He thought much when he was working alone in the fields, and he had spent his time on Sundays in reading his Bible and Prayer-book, and comparing them with Jeph's tracts. Since Emlyn had come, he had made a corner of the cowshed fit to sleep in, by stuffing the walls with dry heather, and the sweet breath of the cows kept it sufficiently warm, and on the winter evenings, he took a lantern there with one of Patience's rush lights, learnt a text or two anew, and then repeated passages to himself and thought over them. What would seem intolerably dull to a lad now, was rest to one who had been rendered older than his age by sorrow and responsibility, and the events that were passing led people to consider religious questions a great deal.

But Stead was puzzled. The minister was not like the soldiers whom he had heard raving about the reign of the saints, and abusing the church. He prayed for the King's having a good deliverance from his troubles, and for the peace of the kingdom, and he gave out that there was to be a week of fasting, preaching, and preparation for the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper.

The better sort of people in the village were very much pleased, nobody except Goody Grace was dissatisfied, and people told her that was only because she was old and given to grumbling at everything new. Blane the Smith tapped Stead on the shoulder, and said, "Hark ye, my lad. If it be true that thou wast in old Parson's secrets, now's the time for thou know'st what."

Stead's mouth was open, and his face blank, chiefly because he did not know what to do, and was taken by surprise, and Blane took it for an answer.

"Oh! if you don't know, that's another thing, but then 'twas for nothing that the troopers flogged you? Well," he muttered, as Stead walked off, "that's a queer conditioned lad, to let himself be flogged, as I wouldn't whip a dog, all out of temper, because he wouldn't answer a question. But he's a good lad, and I'll not bring him into trouble by a word to squire or minister."

The children went off to gather cowslips, and Stead was able to talk it over with Patience, who at first was eager to be rid of the dangerous trust, and added, with a sigh, "That she had never taken the Sacrament since the Easter before poor father was killed, and it must be nigh upon Whitsuntide now."

"That's true," said Stead, "but nobody makes any count of holy days now. It don't seem right, Patience."

"Not like what it used to be," said Patience. "And yet this minister is surely a godly man."

"Father and parson didn't say ought about a godly man. They made me take my solemn promise that I'd only give the things to a lawfully ordained minister."

"He is a minister, and he comes by law," argued Patience. "Do be satisfied, Stead. I'm always in fear now that folks guess we have somewhat in charge; and Emlyn is such a child for prying and chattering. And if they should come and beat thee again, or do worse. Oh, Stead! surely you might give them up to a good man like that; Smith Blane says you ought!"

"I doubt me! I know that sort don't hold with Bishops, and, so far as I can see, by father's old Prayer-book, a lawful minister must have a Bishop to lay hands on him," said Stead, who had studied the subject as far as his means would allow, and had good though slow brains of his own, matured by responsibility. "I'll tell you what, Patience, I'll go and see Dr. Eales about it. I wot he is a minister of the old sort, that father would say I might trust to."

Dr. Eales was still living in Mrs. Lightfoot's lodgings, at the sign of the Wheatsheaf, or more properly starving, for he had only ten pounds a year paid to him out of the benefice that had been taken away from him; and though that went farther then than it would do now, it would not have maintained him, but that his good hostess charged him as little as she could afford, and he also had a few pupils among the gentry's sons, but there were too many clergymen in the same straits for this to be a very profitable undertaking. There were no soldiers in Mrs. Lightfoot's house now, and the doctor lived more at large, but still cautiously, for in the opposite house, named the "Ark," whose gable end nearly met the Wheatsheaf's, dwelt a rival baker, a Brownist, whose great object seemed to be to spy upon the clergyman, and have something to report against him, nor was Mrs. Lightfoot's own man to be trusted. Stead lingered about the open stall where the bread was sold till no customer was at hand, and then mentioned under his breath to the good dame his desire to speak with her lodger.

"Certainly," she said, but the Doctor was now with his pupils at Mistress Rivett's. He always left them at eleven of the clock, more shame of Mrs. Rivett not to give the good man his dinner, which she would never feel. Steadfast had better watch for him at the gate which opened on the down, for there he could speak more privately and securely than at home.

He took the advice, and passed away the time as best he could, learning on the way that a news letter had been received stating that the King was with the Scottish army at Newcastle, and that it was expected that on receiving their arrears of pay, the Scots would surrender him to the Parliament, a proceeding which the folk in the market-place approved or disapproved according to their politics.

Mrs. Rivett's house stood a little apart from the town, with a court and gates opening on the road over the down; and just as eleven strokes were chiming from the town clock below, a somewhat bent, silver-haired man, in a square cap and black gown, leaning on a stick, came out of it. Stead, after the respectful fashion of his earlier days, put his knee to the ground, doffed his steeple-crowned hat and craved a blessing, both he and the Doctor casting a quick glance round so as to be sure there was no one in sight.

Dr. Eales gave it earnestly, as one to whom it was a rare joy to find a country youth thus demanding it, and as he looked at the honest face he said:

"You are mine hostess' good purveyor, methinks, to whom I have often owed a wholesome meal."

"Steadfast Kenton, so please your reverence. There is a secret matter on which I would fain have your counsel, and Mistress Lightfoot thought I might speak to you here with greater safety."

"She did well. Speak on, my good boy, if we walk up and down here we shall be private. It does my heart good to commune with a faithful young son of the Church."

Steadfast told his story, at which the good old Canon was much affected. His brother Holworth, as he called him, was not in prison but in the Virginian plantations. He was still the only true minister of Elmwood, and Mr. Woodley, though owned by the present so-called law of the land, was not there rightly by the law of the Church, and, therefore, Stead was certainly not bound to surrender the trust to him, but rather the contrary.

The Doctor could have gone into a long disquisition about Presbyterian Orders, contradicting the arguments many good and devout people adduced in favour of them, but there was little time, so he only confirmed with authority Stead's belief that a Bishop's Ordination was indispensable to a true pastor, "the only door by which to enter to the charge of the fold."

Then came the other question of attendance on his ministry, and whether to attend the feast given out for the Sunday week, after the long-forced abstinence: Patience's, ever since the break-up of the parish; Steadfast's, since the siege of Bristol. Dr. Eales considered, "I cannot bid you go to that in the efficacy of which neither you nor I believe, my son," he said. "It would not be with faith. Here, indeed, I have ministered privately to a few of the faithful in their own houses, but the risk is over great for you and your sister to join us, espied as we are. How is it with your home?"

"O, sir, would you even come thither?" exclaimed Steadfast, joyfully, and he described his ravine, which was of course known to the Elmwood neighbours, but very seldom visited by them, never except in the middle of the day, and where the thicket and the caverns afforded every facility for concealment.

Whitsun Day was coming, and Dr. Eales proposed to come over to the glen and celebrate the Holy Feast in the very early morning before anyone was astir. There were a few of his Bristol flock who would be thankful for the opportunity of meeting more safely than they could do in the city, since at Easter they had as nearly as possible been all arrested in a pavilion in Mr. Rivett's garden which they had thought unsuspected.

There would be one market day first, and on that Stead would come and explain his preparations, and hear what the Doctor had arranged. And so it was. The time was to be three o'clock, the very dawn of the long summer day, the time when sleep is deepest. Dr. Eales and Mrs. Lightfoot would come out the night before, he not returning after his lesson to the Rivetts, and she making some excuse about going to see friends for the Sunday.

The Rivetts, living outside the gates where sentries still kept guard, could start in the morning, and so could the four others who were to form part of the congregation. Goody Grace was the only person near home whom Patience wished to invite, for she too had grieved over the great deprivation, and had too much heart for the Church to be satisfied with Mr. Woodley's ministrations. Perhaps even she did not understand the difference, but she could be trusted, and the young people knew how happy it would make her.

Little can we guess what such an opportunity was to the faithful children of the Church in those sad days. Goody Grace folded her hands and murmured, "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace," when Patience told her of the invitation, and Patience, though she had all her ordinary work to do, went quietly about it, as if she had some great thought of peace and awe upon her.

"Why, Patience, you seem as if you were making ready for some guest, the Prince of Wales at least!" said Emlyn, on Saturday night.

Patience smiled a sweet little happy smile and in her heart she said "And so I am, and for a greater far!" but she did say "Yes, Emlyn, Dr. Eales is coming to sleep here to-night, and he will pray with us in the early morning."

It had been agreed that the Celebration should take place first, and then after a short pause, the Morning Service. Jerusha was eleven years old, and a very good girl, and since Confirmation was impossible, her brother and sister would have asked for her admission to the Holy Feast without it, but she could not be called up without the danger of awaking Emlyn; and Patience was so sure that it was not safe to trust that damsel with the full knowledge of the treasure that, though Steadfast always thought his sister hard on her, he was forced to give way. The children were to be admitted to Matins, for if any idea oozed out that this latter service had been held, no great danger was likely to come of it. Dr. Eales arrived in the evening, Steadfast meeting him to act as guide, and Patience set before him of her best. A fowl, which she had been forced to broil for want of other means of dressing it; bread baked in a tin with a fire of leaves and small sticks heaped over it; roasted eggs, excellent butter and milk. She apologised for not having dared to fetch any ale for fear of exciting suspicion, but the doctor set her quite at ease by his manifest enjoyment of her little feast, declaring that he had not made so good a meal since Bristol was taken.

Then he catechised the children. Little Ben could say the Lord's Prayer, the Belief, and some of the shorter Commandments, and the doctor patted his little round white cap, and gave him two Turkey figs as a reward.

Jerusha, when she got over her desperate fright enough to speak above a whisper, was quite perfect from her name down to "charity with all men," but Emlyn stumbled horribly over even the first answers, and utterly broke down in the Fourth Commandment; but she smiled up in the doctor's face in her pretty way, and blushed as she said "The chaplain at Blythedale had taught us so far, your reverence."

"And have you learnt no further?"

"If you were here to teach me, sir, I would soon learn it," said the little witch, but she did not come over him as she did with most people.

"You have as good an instructor as I for your needs, in this discreet maiden," said Dr. Eales, and as something of a pout descended on the sparkling little face, "when you know all the answers, perchance Steadfast here may bring you to my lodgings and I will hear you."

"I could learn them myself if I had the book," said Emlyn.

The fact being that the Catechism was taught by Patience from memory in those winter evenings when all went to bed to save candle light, but that when Steadfast retired to the cow-house, Emlyn either insisted on playing with the others or pretended to go to sleep; and twitted Patience with being a Puritan. However, the hopes of going into Bristol might be an incentive, though she indulged in a grumble to Rusha, and declared that she liked a jolly chaplain, and this old doctor was not a bit better than a mere Puritan.

Rusha opened her big eyes. She never did understand Emlyn, and perhaps that young maiden took delight in shocking her. They were ordered off to bed much sooner than they approved on that fair summer night, when the half-moon was high and the nightingales were singing all round—not that they cared for that, but there was a sense about them that something mysterious was going on, and Emlyn was wild with curiosity and vexation at being kept out of it.

She would have kept watch and crept out; but that Patience came in, and lay down, so close to the door that it was impossible to get out without waking her, and besides if Emlyn did but stir, she asked what was the matter.

"They mean something!" said Emlyn to herself, "and I'll know what it is. They have no right to keep me out of the plot; I am not like stupid little Rusha! I have been in a siege, and four battles, besides skirmishes! I'll watch till they think I'm asleep, if I pull all the hulls out of my bed! Then they will begin."

But nothing moved that Emlyn could hear or see. She woke and slept, but was quite aware when Patience rose up after a brief doze, and found the first streaks of dawn in the sky, a cuckoo calling as if for very life in the nearest tree, and Steadfast quietly sweeping the dew from the grass in a little open space shut in by rocks, trees, and bushes, close to the bank of the brook.

A chest which he kept in the cow-shed, and which bore traces of the fire in the old house, had been brought down to serve as an Altar, and it was laid over, for want of anything better, with one of poor Mrs. Kenton's best table-cloths, which Patience had always thought too good for use.

The next thing was to meet the rest of the scanty congregation at the entrances of the wood, and guide them to the spot. This was safely done, Goody Grace knew the way, and had guided one of the old Elmwood maid servants whom she had managed to shelter for the night. Mrs. Lightfoot was there with Mrs. Rivett, her daughter, elder son, and a grave-looking man servant, Mr. Henshaw, a Barbados merchant, with his wife, and a very worn battered shabby personage, but unmistakably a gentleman of quality, and wounded in the wars, for he was so lame that the merchant had to help him over the rough paths.

It was a wonderful Whitsun-day morning that none of the little party could ever forget. The sunrise could not be seen in that deep, narrow place, but the sky was of a strange pale shining blue, and the tender young green of the trees overhead was touched with gold, the glades of the wood were intensely blue with hyacinths, and with all sorts of delicate greens twined above in the bushes over them. A wild cherry, all silver white, was behind their Altar, the green floor was marbled with cuckoo flowers and buttercups, and the clear little stream whose voice murmured by was fringed with kingcups and forget-me-nots. The scents were of the most delicious dewy freshness; and as to the sounds! Larks sang high up in the sky, wood pigeons cooed around, nightingales, thrushes, every bird of the wood seemed to be trying to make music and melody.

And in the midst the grey-haired priest stood close to an ivy-covered rock, with the white covered Altar, and the bright golden vessels which he had carefully looked to in the night, and the little congregation knelt close round him on cloaks and mats, the women hooded, the old Cavalier's long thin locks, the merchant's dark ones, and the close cropped heads of the servant and of Steadfast bared to the morning breeze in its pure, dewy, soft freshness, fit emblem of the Comforter. No book was produced, all was repeated from memory. They durst not raise their voices, but the birds were their choir, and as they murmured their Gloria in Excelsis, the sweet notes rang out in that unconscious praise.

When the blessing of peace had been given there was a long hush, and no one rose till after the vessels had been replaced in their casket, and Stead was climbing up with it again to the hiding place. Then there was a move to the front of the hut, where Rusha was just awakening, and Emlyn feigned to be still asleep. It was not yet four o'clock, but the sweet freshness was still around everything. Young Mistress Alice Rivett and her brother were enchanted to gather flowers, and ran after their hosts to see the cows milked, and the goats, pigs, and poultry fed, sights new to them; but the elder ladies shivered and were glad to warm themselves at the little fire Patience hastily lighted, after cleaning the hut as fast as she could, by rolling up the bedding, and fairly carrying Ben out to finish his night's rest in the cow-house.

The guests had brought their provisions, and insisted that their young hosts should eat with them, accepting only the warm milk that Patience brought in her pail, and they drank from the horn cups of the family. Dr. Eales observed to the Cavalier that it was a true Agape or love-feast like those of the ancient Church, and the gentleman's melancholy, weather-beaten face relaxed into a smile as he sighed and hoped that the same endurance as that of the Christians of old would be granted in this time of persecution.

Emlyn was gratified at being a good deal noticed by the company as so unlike the others. She was not shy and frightened like Rusha, who hung her head and had not a word to say for herself, but chattered away to the young Rivetts, showing them the kid, the calves, and the lambs, taking Mistress Alice to the biggest cowslips and earliest wild roses, and herself making a sweet posy for each of the ladies. The old Cavalier himself, Colonel Harford, was even amused with the pretty little maid, who, he told Dr. Eales, resembled Mirth as Master John Milton had depicted her, ere he took up with General Cromwell and his crew; and was a becoming figure for this early morn.

On learning the child's history, he turned out to know Sir Harry Blythedale, but not to have heard of him since they had parted at Newark, he to guard the king to Oxford, Sir Harry to join Lord Astley, and he much feared that the old knight had been killed at Stowe, in the fight between Astley and Brereton. This would account for nothing having been heard from him about Emlyn, but Colonel Harford promised, if any opportunity should offer, to communicate with Lady Blythedale, whom he believed to be living at Worcester; and he patted Emlyn on the head, called her a little loyal veteran, accepted a tiny posy of forget-me-not from her, and after fumbling in his pocket, gave her a crown piece. Steadfast and Patience were afraid it was his last, and much wished she had contrived not to take it, but she said she should keep it for a remembrance.

After this rest, the beautiful Whitsuntide Matins was said in the fair forest church, and before six o'clock this strange and blessed festival had ended, though not the peace and thankfulness in the hearts of the little flock.

Indeed, instead of a sermon, Dr. Eales's parting words were "And he went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights."



CHAPTER XVI. A FAIR OFFER.

"We be content," the keepers said, "We three and you no less, Then why should we of you be afraid, As we never did transgress." ROBIN HOOD BALLAD.

Steadfast was busy weeding the little patch of barley that lay near the ruins of the old farm house with little Ben basking round him. The great carefulness as to keeping the ground clear had been taught him by his father, and was one reason why his fields, though so small, did not often bear a bad crop. He heard his name called over the hedge, and looking up saw the Squire, Mr. Elmwood, on horseback.

He came up, respectfully taking off his hat and standing with it in his hand as was then the custom when thus spoken to. "What is this I hear, Kenton," said the squire, "that you have been having a prelatist service on your ground?"

Steadfast was dismayed, but did not speak, till Mr. Elmwood added, "Is it true?"

"Yes, sir," he answered resolutely.

"Did you know it was against the law to use the Book of Common Prayer?"

"There was no book, sir."

"But you do not deny it was the same superstitious and Popish ceremony and festival abolished by law."

"No, sir," Stead allowed, though rather by gesture than word.

"Now, look you here, young Kenton, I ask no questions. I do not want to bring anyone into trouble, and you are a hard-working, honest lad by what they tell me, who have a brother fighting in the good Cause and have suffered from the lawless malignants yourself. Was it not the Prince's troopers that wrought this ruin?" pointing towards the blackened gable, "and shot down your father? Aye! The more shame you should hold with them! I wish you no harm I say, nor the blinded folk who must have abused your simplicity: but I am a justice of the peace, and I will not have laws broken on my land. If this thing should happen again, I shall remember that you have no regular or lawful tenure of this holding, and put you forth from it."

He waited, but a threat always made silent resistance easy to Steadfast, and there was no answer.

Mr. Elmwood, however, let that pass, for he was not a hard or a fanatical man, and he knew that to hold such a service was not such an easy matter that it was likely to be soon repeated. He looked round at the well-mended fences, the clean ground, and the tokens of intelligent industry around, and the clean homespun shirt sleeves that spoke of the notable manager at home. "You are an industrious fellow, my good lad," he said, "how long have you had this farm to yourself?"

"Getting on for five years, your honour," said Steadfast.

"And is that your brother?"

"Yes, please your honour," picking Ben up in his arms to prevent the barley from being pulled up by way of helping him.

"How many of you are there?"

"Five of us, sir, but my eldest brother is in Captain Venn's troop."

"So I heard, and what is this about a child besides?"

"An orphan, sir, I found after the skirmish at the mill stream, who was left with us till her friends can send after her."

"Well, well. You seem a worthy youth," said Mr. Elmwood, who was certainly struck and touched by the silent uncomplaining resolution of the mere stripling who had borne so heavy a burthen. "If you were heartily one of us, I should be glad to make you woodward, instead of old Tomkins, and build up yonder house for you, but I cannot do it for one who is hankering after prelacy, and might use the place for I know not what plots and conspiracies of the malignants."

Again Steadfast took refuge in a little bow of acknowledgment, but kept his lips shut, till again the squire demanded, "What do you think of it? There's a fair offer. What have you to say for yourself?"

He had collected himself and answered, "I thank you, sir. You are very good. If you made me woodward, I would serve your honour faithfully, and have no plots or the like there. But, your honour, I was bred up in the Church and I cannot sell myself."

"Why, you foolish, self-conceited boy, what do you know about it? Is not what is good enough for better men than you fit to please you?"

To this Stead again made no answer, having said a great deal for him.

"Well," said Mr. Elmwood, angered at last, "if ever I saw a dogged moon-calf, you are one! However, I let you go scot free this time, in regard for your brother's good service, and the long family on your hands, but mind, I shall put in an active woodward instead of old Tomkins, who has been past his work these ten years, and if ever I hear of seditious or prelatical doings in yonder gulley again, off you go."

He rode off, leaving Steadfast with temper more determined, but mind not more at ease. The appointment of a woodward was bad news, for the copsewood and the game had been left to their fate for the last few years, and what were the rights of the landlord over them Stead did not know, so that there might be many causes of trouble, especially if the said woodward considered him a person to be specially watched. Indeed, the existence of such a person would make a renewal of what Mr. Elmwood called the prelatist assembly impossible, and with a good deal of sorrow he announced the fact on the next market day to Mrs. Lightfoot. He could not see Dr. Eales, but when next he came in, she gave him a paper on which was simply marked "Ps. xxxvii, 7." He looked out the reference and found "Hold thee still in the Lord and abide patiently upon Him." Stead hoped that Patience and the rest would never know what an offer had been made to him, but Master Brown, who had recommended him, and who did not at all like the prospect of a strange woodward, came to expostulate with him for throwing away such a chance for a mere whim, telling Patience she was a sensible wench and ought to persuade her brother to see what was for his own good and the good of all, holding up himself as an example.

"I never missed my church and had the parson's good word all along, and yet you see I am ready to put up with this good man without setting myself up to know more than my elders and betters! Eh! Hast not a word to say for thyself? Then I'll tell the squire, who is a good and friendly gentleman to all the old servants, that you have thought better of it, and will thankfully take his kindness, and do your best."

"I cannot go against father," said Steadfast.

"And what would he have done, good man, but obey them that have the rule, and let wiser folk think for thee. But all the young ones are pig-headed as mules now-a-days, and must think for themselves, one running off to the Independents, and one to the Quakers and Shakers, and one to the Fifth Monarchy men, and you, Steadfast Kenton, that I thought better things of, talking of the Church and offending the squire with thy prelatic doings, that have been forbidden by Act of Parliament. What say you to that, my lad? Come, out with it," for Stead had more difficulty in answering Master Brown, who had been a great authority throughout his life, than even the Squire himself.

"Parson said there was higher law than Parliament."

"Eh! What, the King? He is a prisoner, bless him, but they will never let him go till they have bent him to their will, and what will you do then?"

"Not the King," muttered Steadfast.

"Eh! what! If you have come to pretending to know the law of God better than your elders, you are like the rest of them, and I have done with you." And away tramped the steward in great displeasure, while Patience put her apron over her head and cried bitterly.

She supposed Stead might be right, but what would it not have been to have the old house built up, and all decent about them as it was in mother's time, and fit places to sleep in, now that the wenches were growing bigger?

"But you know, Patty, we are saving for that."

"Aye, and how long will it take? And now this pestilent woodward will be always finding fault—killing the fowls and ducks, and seizing the swine and sheep, and very like slaughtering the dogs and getting us turned out of house and home; for now you have offended the squire, he will believe anything against us."

"Come, Patty, you know I could not help it. This is sorest of all, you that have always stood by me and father's wish."

"Yes, yes," sobbed Patience. "I wot you are right, Stead. I'll hold to you, though I wish—I wish you would think like other folk."

Yet Patience knew in her secret soul that then he would not be her own Steadfast, and she persuaded him no more, though the discomforts and deficiencies of their present home tried her more and more as the family grew older. Stead had contrived a lean-to, with timbers from the old house, and wattled sides stuffed with moss, where he and little Ben slept in summer time, and they had bought or made some furniture—a chair and table, some stools, bedding, and kitchen utensils, and she toiled to keep things clean, but still it was a mere hovel, with the door opening out into the glade. Foxes and polecats prowled, owls hooted, and the big dog outside was a needful defender, even in summer time, and in winter the cold was piteous, the wet even worse, and they often lost some of their precious animals—chickens died of cold, and once three lambs had been carried away in a sudden freshet. Yet Patience, when she saw Steadfast convinced, made up her mind to stand by him, and defended him when the younger girls murmured.

Rusha was of a quiet, acquiescent, contented nature, and said little, as Emlyn declared, "She knew nothing better;" but Emlyn was more and more weary of the gulley, and as nothing was heard of her friends, and she was completely one of the home, she struggled more with the dullness and loneliness. She undertook all errands to the village for the sake of such change as a chatter with the young folk there afforded her, or for the chance of seeing the squire's lady or sons and daughters go by; and she was wild to go on market days to Bristol.



In spite of Puritan greyness, soldiers, sailors, gentlemen, ladies, and even fashions, such as they were, could be seen there, and news picked up, and Emlyn would fain have persuaded Steadfast that she should be the most perfect market woman, if he would only let her ride in on the donkey between the panniers, in a broad hat, with chickens and ducks dangling round, eggs, butter, and fruit or nuts, and even posies, according to the season, and sit on the steps of the market-place among the other market women and girls.

Steadfast would have been the last to declare that her laughing dark eyes, and smiling lips, and arch countenance would not bring many a customer, but he knew well that his mother would never have sent his sister to be thus exposed, and he let her pout, or laughed away her refusal by telling her that he was bound not to let a butler's daughter demean herself to be stared at by all the common folk, who would cheapen her wares.

And when she did coax him to take her to Bristol on any errand she could invent, to sell her yarns, or buy pins, or even a ribbon, he was inexorable in leaving her under Mrs. Lightfoot's care, and she had to submit, even though it sometimes involved saying her catechism to Dr. Eales. Yet that always ended in the old man's petting her. It was only from her chatter that the old clergyman ever knew of the proposal that Stead had rejected for conscience's sake. It vexed the lad so much that he really could not bear to think of it, and it would come over him now and then, was it all for nothing? Would the Church ever lift up her head again? or would Mr. Woodley be always in possession at Elmwood Church, where everyone seemed to be content with him. The Kentons went thither. It was hardly safe to abstain, for a fine upon absence was still the law of the land, though seldom enforced; and Dr. Eales who considered Presbyterianism by far the least unorthodox and most justifiable sect, had advised Stead not to allow himself or the others altogether to lose the habit of public worship, but to abstain from Communions which might be an act of separation from the Church, and which could not be accepted by her children as genuine. Such was the advice of most of the divines of the English Church in this time of eclipse; and though Stead, and still less Patience, did not altogether follow the reasoning, they obeyed, while aware that they incurred suspicion from the squire by not coming to "the table."

The new woodward, Peter Pierce, was not one of the villagers as usual, but had been a soldier in one of the regiments of the Earl of Essex, in which Mr. Elmwood's eldest son had served.

Instead of succeeding to old Tomkins's lodge in the great wood, he had a new one built for him, so as to command the opening of Hermit's Gulley towards the village, and one of the Bristol roads. Could this be for the sake of watching over anything so insignificant as the Kentons?

The copse on their side of the brook was their own, free to do what they chose with except cutting down the timber trees, but the further side was the landlord's, as they had now to remember; and as, when the brook was at its lowest, their pigs and goats were by no means likely to recollect; though Steadfast was extremely anxious to give no occasion for the mistrust and ill-will with which Pierce regarded him, as a squatter, trespasser, and poacher, almost as a matter of course, and likewise a prelatist and plotter.

Once he did find a kid on the wrong side, standing on a rock, browsing a honeysuckle, and was about either to seize it or shoot it, as it went off in three bounds, when Emlyn darted out, and threw herself between. It was her darling kid, it should never trespass again, she would—she would thank him ever more—if he would spare it this once.

And Emlyn as usual had touched the soft place in the heart of even a woodward. He told her not to cry, and contented himself with growling a tremendous warning to Steadfast and Patience.

There were several breezes about Growler, who was only too apt to use his liberty in pursuing rabbits on the wrong side, and whom Peter more than once condemned; but Emlyn and Ben begged him off, and he was kept well chained up. At last, however, he won even the woodward's favour by the slaughter of a terrible wild cat and her brood, after all Peter's dogs had returned with bleeding faces from the combat.

The woodward had another soft place in his heart. He had a pretty young wife and a little son. Nanny Pierce was older in years, but far more childish than Patience, and the life in this gulley seemed to her utter solitude and desolation, and if Patience had been ten times a poacher and a prelatist, she could not have helped making friends with the only creature of her own kind within a mile. And when Patience's experience with Ben and other older babes at rest in the churchyard, had aided the poor little helpless woman through a convulsion fit of her baby's before Goody Grace could arrive, Peter himself owned that "the Kenton wench was good for somewhat," though he continued to think Steadfast's great carefulness not to transgress, only a further proof that "he was a deep one"—all the more because he refused to let anyone but himself have a search for a vanished polecat in "them holes," which Peter was persuaded contained some mystery, though Steadfast laid it, and not untruly, on the health of the young stock he kept penned in the caves, which were all, he hoped, of which Peter was aware.

All this was harassing, but a greater trouble came in the second winter. Good Dr. Eales was failing, and the tidings of the King's execution were a blow that he never recovered. Mrs. Lightfoot had tears in her eyes when Stead asked after him, week by week, and she could only say that he was feebler, and spent all his days in prayer—often with tears.

At last came peace. He lay still and calm, and sent a message that young Kenton should be brought to him for a last farewell.

And as Stead stood sorrowful and awed by his bed side, he bade the youth never despair or fall away from his hope of the restoration of the Church.

"Remember," he said, "she is founded on a rock, and the gates of hell shall never prevail against her. She shall stand forth for evermore as the moon, which wanes but to wax again; and I have good hope that thou wilt see it, my son. He that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved."

Then Dr. Eales pointed to a small parcel of books, which he had caused Mrs. Lightfoot to put together, telling Steadfast that he had selected them alike for devotion and for edification, and that if he studied them, he would have no doubt when he might deliver up his trust to a true priest of the Church.

"And if none should return in my time?" asked Steadfast.

"Have I not told thee never to despair of God's care for His Church? Yet His time is not as our time, and it may be—that young as thou art—the days of renewal may not be when thou shalt see them. Should it thus be, my son, leave the secret with one whom thou canst securely trust. Better the sacred vessels should lie hidden than that thou shouldst show thy faith wanting by surrendering them to any, save according to the terms of thy vow. See, Steadfast, among these books is a lighter one, a romance of King Arthur, that I loved well in my boyhood, and which may not only serve thee as fair pastime in the winter nights, but will mind thee of thine high and holy charge, for it goeth deeper than the mere outside."

His voice was growing weak. Mrs. Lightfoot gave him a cordial, and Stead knelt by his bedside, felt his hand on his head, and heard his blessing for the last time. The next market day, when he called at the good bakester's stall, she told him in floods of tears that the guest who had brought a blessing on her house, was gone to his rest.



CHAPTER XVII. THE GROOM IN GREY.

"Heroes and kings, in exile forced to roam, Leave swelling phrase and seven-leagued words at home." SCOTT.

Another summer and winter had gone by and harvest time had come again, when Steadfast with little Ben, now seven years old, for company, took two sacks of corn to be ground at the mill, where the skirmish had been fought in which Emlyn's father had been killed.

The sacks were laid across a packsaddle on a stout white horse, with which, by diligent saving, Steadfast had contrived to replace Whitefoot, Ben was promised a ride home when the sacks should have been emptied, and trotted along in company with Growler by his brother's side, talking more in an hour than Stead did in a week, and looking with great interest to be shown the hawthorn bush where Emlyn had been found. For Stead and Ben were alike in feeling the bright, merry, capricious, laughing, teasing Emlyn the charm and delight of home. In trouble, or for real aid, they went to Patience, but who was like Emlyn for drollery and diversion? Who ever made Stead laugh as she could, or who so played with Ben, and never, like Rusha, tried to be maidenly, discreet, nay, dull?

It was very inconvenient that just as they reached the famous thorn bush, the white horse began to demonstrate that his shoe was loose. They were very near the mill, and after disposing of the sacks, the brothers led the horse on to a forge, about a furlong beyond. It was not a place of which Stead was fond, as the smith was known to be strong for the Covenant, and he could not help wishing that the shoe had come off nearer to his good friend Smith Blane.

Original-Sin Hopkins, which was the name of the blacksmith, was in great excitement, as he talked of the crowning mercy vouchsafed at Worcester, and how the son of the late man, Charles Stewart, had been utterly defeated, and his people scattered like sheep without a shepherd. Three or four neighbours were standing about, listening to the tidings he had heard from a messenger on the way to Bristol. One was leaning on the unglazed window frame, and a couple of old men basking, even in that September day, in the glow of the fire, while a few women and children loitered around, thinking it rather fine to hear Master Original-Sin declaim on the backsliding of the Scots in upholding the son of the oppressor.

The shoeing of Stead Kenton's horse seemed a trivial matter beneath the attention of such an orator; but he vouchsafed to bid his lad drive in a few nails; and just as the task was commenced, there came to the forge a lady in a camlet riding dress and black silk hood, walking beside a stout horse, which a groom was leading with great care, for it had evidently lost a shoe. And it had a saddle with a pillion on which they had been riding double, after the usual fashion of travelling for young and healthy gentlewomen in those days of bad roads.

The lady, a quiet, self-possessed person, not in her first youth, came forward, and in the first pause in the blacksmith's declamation, begged that he would attend to her horse.

He gave a nod as if intending her to wait till Steadfast's work was done, and went on. "And has it not been already brought about that the man of blood hath—"

"So please you," interrupted the lady, "to shoe my horse at once. I am on my way to Abbotsleigh, and my cousin, Mr. Norton, knows that my business brooks no delay."

Mr. Norton, though a Royalist, was still the chief personage in that neighbourhood, and his name produced sufficient effect on Original-Sin to make him come forward, look at the hoof, and select a shoe from those hung on the walls of his forge. Little Ben looked on, highly delighted to watch the proceedings, and Steadfast, as he waited, glanced towards the servant, a well-made young man, in a trim, sober suit of grey cloth, with a hat a good deal slouched over a dark swarthy face, that struck Stead as having been seen by him before.

After all, the lady's horse was the first finished. Hopkins looked at all the other three shoes, tapped them with his hammer, and found them secure, received the money from the lady, but gave very slight salutations as the pair remounted, and rode away.

Then he twisted up his features and observed, "Here is a dispensation! As I am a living soul, this horse shoe was made at Worcester. I know the make. My cousin was apprenticed there."

"Well, outlandish work goes against one's stomach," said one of the bystanders, "but what of that, man?"

"Seest thou not, Jabez Holt? Is not the young man there one of them who trouble Israel, and the lady is striving for his escape. Mr. Norton is well known as a malignant at heart, and his man Pope hath been to and fro these last days as though evil were being concerted. I would that good Master Hatcham were here."

"Poor lad. Let him alone. 'Tis hard he should not get off," said one of the bystanders.

"I tell thee he is one of the brood of Satan, who have endeavoured to break up the godly peace of the saints, and fill this goodly land with blood and fire. Is it not said 'Root them out that they be no more a people?'"

"Have after them, then," said another of the company. "We want no more wars, to be taking our cows and killing our pigs. After them, I say!"

"You haven't got no warrant, 'Riginal," said a more cautious old man. "Best be on the safe side. Go after constable first, and raise the hue-and-cry. You'll easy overtake them. Breakneck Hill be sore for horseflesh."

"I'd fain see Master Hatcham," said the smith, scratching his head.

Stead had meantime been listening as he paid his pence. It flashed over him now where he had beheld those intensely dark eyes, and the very peculiar cut of features, though they had then been much more boyish. It was when he had seen the Prince of Wales going to the Cathedral on Christmas Day, in the midst of all his plumed generals, with their gay scarfs, and rich lace collars.

He had put little Ben on horseback, and turned away into the long, dirty lane, or rather ditch, that led homeward, before, through his consternation, there dawned on him what to do. A gap in the hedge lay near, through which he dragged the horse into a pasture field, to the great amazement of Ben, saying "See here, Ben, those folk want to take yonder groom in grey. We will go and warn them."

Ben heartily assented.

"I like the groom," he said. "He jumped me five times off the horseblock, and he patted Growler and called him a fine fellow, who didn't deserve his name—worth his salt he was sure. We won't give Growler salt, Stead, but don't let that ugly preaching man get the good groom!"

Steadfast was by this time on the horse behind his little brother, pressing through the fields, which by ancient custom were all thrown open from harvest time till Christmas; and coming out into the open bit of common that the travellers had to pass before arriving at Breakneck Hill, he was just in time to meet them as they trotted on. He hardly knew what he said, as he doffed his hat, and exclaimed—

"Madam, you are pursued."

"Pursued!" Both at once looked back.

"There's time," said Steadfast; "but Smith Hopkins said one of the shoes was Worcester make, and he is gone to fetch the constable and raise the hue-and-cry."

"And you are a loyal—I mean an honest lad—come to warn us," said the groom.

"Yes, sir. I think, if you will trust me, they can be put off the track."

"Trusty! Your face answers for you. Eh, fair Mistress Jane?"

"Sir, it must be as you will."

"This way then, sir," said Steadfast, who was off his own horse by this time, and leading it into a rough track through a thicket whence some timber had been drawn out in the summer.

"They will see where we turned off," whispered the lady.

"No, ma'am, not unless you get off the hard ground. Besides they will go on the way to Breakneck Hill. Hark! I hear a hallooing. Not near—no—no fear, madam."

They were by this time actually hidden from the common by the copsewood, and the distant shouts of the hue-and-cry kept all silent till they were fairly out beyond it, not far from Stead's own fields.

Happily they had hitherto met no one, but there was danger now of encountering gleaners, and indeed Stead's white horse could be seen from a distance, and might attract attention to his companions.

"Hallo!" exclaimed the groom, as they halted under shelter of a pollard willow. "I've heard tell that a white horse is the surest mark for a bullet in a battle, and if that be Breakneck Hill, as you call it, your beast may bring the sapient smith down on us. Had we not best part?"

"Aye," said Steadfast. "I was thinking what was best. Whither were you going?"

He blurted it out, not knowing to whom to address himself, or how to frame his speech. The lady hesitated, but her companion named Castle Carey.

"Then, please your honour," said Stead, impartially addressing both, "methinks the best course would be, if this—"

"Groom William," suggested that personage.

"Would go down into yonder covert with my little brother here, where my poor place is, and where my sister can show a safe hiding-place, in case Master Hopkins suspects me, and follows; but I scarce think he will. Then meanwhile, if the lady will trust herself to me—"

"O! there is no danger for me," she said.

"Go on, my Somerset Solomon," said the groom.

"Then would I take the lady on for a short space to a good woman in Elmwood there. And on the way this horse shall lose his Worcester shoe, and I will get Smith Blane, who is an honest fellow, to put on another; and when the chase is like to be over, I will come back for him and put you on the cross lane for Castle Carey, which don't join with the road you came by, till just ere you get into the town."

"There's wit as well as cheese in Somerset. What say you, my guardian angel?" said Groom William.

"It sounds well," she reluctantly answered. "Does Mr. Norton know you, young man?"

"No, madam," said Stead, with much stumbling. "But I have seen him in Bristol. My Lady Elmwood knew of me, and Sir George Elmwood too, and the Dean could say I was honest."

"Which the face of you says better than your tongue," said the groom. "Have with you then, my bold little elf," he added, taking the bridle of the horse on which Ben was still seated. "Or one moment more. You knew me, my lad—are there any others like to do so?"

"I had seen you, sir, at Bristol, and that is why I would not have you shew yourself in Elmwood. But my sister has never seen you, and the only neighbours who ever come in are the woodward and his wife. He served in my Lord of Essex's army, but he has never seen you. Moreover, he was to be at the squire's to-day helping to stack his corn. Ben, do you tell Patience that he"—again taking refuge in a pronoun—"is a gentleman in danger, and she must see to his safety for an hour or two till I come back for him."

"A gentleman in danger," repeated Ben, anxious to learn his lesson.

"He and I will take care of that," said the grey-coated groom gaily, as he turned the horse's head, and waved his hat in courtly fashion to the lady so that Steadfast saw that his hair was cropped into black stubble.

"Ah!" said the lady with a sigh, for the loss of a Cavalier's locks was a dreadful thing. "You know him then."

"I have seen him at Bristol," said Steadfast, with considerably less embarrassment, though still in the clownish way he could not shake off.

"And you know how great is the trust you—nay, we have undertaken. But, as he says, he has learnt the true fidelity of a leathern jerkin."

Then Jane Lane told Steadfast of the King's flight from Worcester, and adventures at Boscobel with the Penderells, and how she had brought him to Abbotsleigh, in hopes of finding a ship at Bristol, but that failing, it was too perilous for him to remain there, so that she was helping him as far as Castle Carey on his way to Trent.

Before they were clear of the wood, Stead asked her to pause. He knocked off the tell-tale shoe with the help of a stone, threw it away into the middle of a bramble, and then after a little consultation, she decided on herself encountering the smith, not perhaps having much confidence in the readiness of speech or invention of her companion.

When they arrived at the forge, where good-humoured, brawny Harry Blane was no small contrast to his gaunt compeer Original-Sin Hopkins, she averred that she was travelling from her relations, and having been obliged to send her servant back for a packet that had been forgotten, this good youth, who had come to her help when her horse had cast a shoe, had undertaken to guide her to the smith's, and to take her again to meet her man, if he did not come for her himself. Might she be allowed in the meantime to sit with Master Blane's good housewife?

Master Blane was only too happy, and Mistress Jane Lane was accordingly introduced to the pleasant kitchen, with sanded floor, and big oak table, open hearth, and beaupots in the oriel window where the spinning-wheel stood, and where the neat and hospitable Dame Blane made her kindly welcome.

Steadfast, marvelling at her facility of speech, and glad the king's safety did not depend on his uttering such a story, told Blane that he must go after his cattle and should look after the groom on the way.

As he walked through the wood, and drew near the glade, he was dismayed to hear voices, and to see Peter Pierce leaning against the wall of the house, but Rusha came running up to him exclaiming, "Oh! Stead, here is this good stranger that you met, telling us all about brother Jeph."

"Yes, my kind host," said the grey-coated guest, with a slight nasal intonation, rising as Stead came near, "I find that you are the very lad my friend and brother Jephthah Kenton, that singular Christian man, bade me search out. 'If you go near Bristol, beloved,' quoth he,' search me out my brothers Steadfast and Benoni, and my sisters, Patience and Jerusha, and greet them well from me, and bear witness of me to them. They dwell, said he, in a lonely hut in the wood side, and with them a fair little maiden, sprung of the evil and idolatrous seed of the malignants, but whom their pious nurture may yet bring to a knowledge of the truth,' and by that token, I knew that it was the same." There was an odd little twinkle towards Emlyn just then.

"And Stead, Jeph is an officer," said Patience, who was busied in setting before the visitor on a little round table, the best ale, bread, cheese, and butter that her hut afforded, together with an onion, which, he declared, was "what his good grandfather, a valiant man for the godly, had ever loved best."

"An officer! Aye is he. A captain of his Ironside troop, very like to be Colonel ere long."

Stead was absolutely bewildered, and could not find speech, beyond an awkward "Where?"

"Where was he when I last saw him? Charging down the main street of Worcester, where the malignants and Charles Stewart made their last stand. Smiting them hip and thigh with the sword of Gedaliah, nay, my tongue tripped, 'twas Gideon I would say."

"Aye," said the woodward, "Squire had the tidings two days back in a news letter. It was a mighty victory of General Cromwell."

"In sooth it was," returned the groom; "and I hear he hath ordered a solemn thanksgiving therefore."

"But Jephthah," put in Patience, "you are sure he was not hurt?"

"The hand of Heaven protecteth the godly," again through his nose spoke the guest. "He was well when I left him; being sent south by my master to attend my mistress, and so being no more among them that divide the spoil."

"Where have you served, sir?" demanded the woodward.

"I am last from Scotland," was the answer. "A godly land!"

"Ah! I know nought of Scotland," said the woodward. "I was disbanded when my Lord Essex gave up the command, more's the pity, for he was for doing things soberly and reasonably, and ever in the name of the poor King that is gone! You look too young to have seen fire at Edgehill or Exeter, sir."

"Did I not?" said the youth. "Aye, I was with my father, though only as a boy apart on a hill."

The reminiscences that were exchanged astonished Steadfast beyond measure, and really made him doubt whether what had previously passed had not been all a dream. The language was so like Jephthah's own too, all except that one word "fair" applied to Emlyn; and Patience, Rusha, and the Pierces were entirely without a suspicion, that their guest was other than he seemed. How much must have been picked out of little Ben, without the child's knowing it, to make such acting possible?

And how was the woodward, who was so much delighted with the visitor, to be shaken off? Stead stood silent, puzzled, anxious, and wondering what to do next, a very heavy and awkward host, so that even Patience wondered what made him so shy.

Suddenly, however, a whistle, and the sharp yap of a dog was heard across the stream. Nanny Pierce exclaimed, "There are those rascal lads after the rabbits again!" and the gamekeeper's instinct awoke. Pierce shook hands with his fellow soldier, regretted he could not see more of him, and received his promise that if he came that way again, he would share a pottle of ale at the lodge; and then tramped off after his poachers over the stream.

Groom William then kissed the young women (the usual mode of salutation then), Nanny Pierce and all, thanked Patience, and looked about for the goodly little malignant, as he called Emlyn, but she was nowhere to be seen, and Stead hurried him off through the wood.

"Ho! ho! sly rascal," said Charles, as they turned away. "You're jealous! You would keep the game to yourself."

Stead had no answer to make to this banter, the very notion of Emlyn as aught but the orphan in his charge was new to him.

They were not yet beyond the gulley when from between the hazel stems, out sprang Emlyn, and kneeling on the ground caught the King's hand and kissed it.

"Fairy-haunted wood!" cried Charles, and indeed it was done with great natural grace, and the little figure with the glowing cheeks, her hood flying back so as to shew her brilliant eyes sparkling with delight and enthusiasm, was a truly charming vision. "It is like one of the masques of the merry days of old." And as he retained her hand and returned the salute on her lips, "Queen Mab herself, for who else saw through thy poor brother sovereign's mean disguise?"

"I had seen your Majesty with the army," replied Emlyn, modestly blushing a good deal.

"Ah! The Fates have provided me with a countenance the very worst for straits like mine. But that matters the less since it is only my worthy subjects who see through the grey coat. I would lay my crown, if I had it, to one of those crispy ringlets of yours, that Queen Mab was the poacher who drew off the crop-eared keeper."

"'Tis Robin Goodfellow, please your Majesty, who leads clowns astray," said Emlyn in the same tone.

"Sometimes a horse I'll be, sometimes a hound," quoted the King.

Stead could only listen in amazement without a word to say for himself. Near the confines of the wood, he had to leave Emlyn to guide the King over a field-path while he fetched Mrs. Jane Lane and the horse to meet them beyond, as it was wiser for the King not to shew himself in the village. Again Charles jested on his supposed jealousy of leaving the fair Queen Mab alone in such company, and on his blunt answer, "I only feared the saucy child might be troublesome, sir."

At which the King laughed the more, and even Emlyn smiled a little.

All was safely accomplished, and when Steadfast had brought Mrs. Lane to the deep lane, they found the King and Emlyn standing by the stile, and could hear the laughter of both as they approached.

"He can always thus while away his cares," said Jane Lane in quite a motherly tone. "And well it is that he is of so joyous a nature."

Perhaps it was said as a kind of excuse for the levity of one in so much danger chattering to the little woodland maid so mirthfully, and like one on an equality. When they appeared, Charles bestowed a kiss on Emlyn's lips, and shook hands cordially with Steadfast, lamenting that he had no reward, nor even a token to leave with them.

Stead made his rustic bow, pinched his hat, and muttered, "It is enough to—"

"Enough reward to have served your Majesty," said Emlyn, "he would say."

"Yea, and it is your business to find words for him, pretty one," said the King. "A wholesome partnership—eh? He finds worth, and you find wit! And so we leave the fairy buried in the woodland."

And on the wanderers rode, while Steadfast and Emlyn turned back over the path through the fields; and she eagerly told that the King had slept at Blythedale on his way to Worcester, and that though Sir Harry was dead, his son was living in Holland. "And if the King gets there safely, he will tell Master George, and if my uncle is with him, no doubt he will send for me, or mayhap, come and fetch me."

There was a shock of pain in Steadfast's heart.

"You would be glad?"

"Poor old Stead. I would scarce be glad to quit you. I doubt me if the Hague, as they call it, would show me any one I should care for as much as for your round shoulders, you good old lubber! But you should come too, and the King would give you high preferment, when he comes to his own again, and then we won't be buried alive in this Hermit's Gulley."

She danced about in exultation, hardly knowing what wild nonsense she talked, and Stead was obliged to check her sharply in an attempt to sing

"The king shall enjoy his own again."

"But Stead," asked Ben, after long reflection, "how could Groom William know all about brother Jeph?"

A question Stead would not hear, not wishing to destroy confidence in His Majesty's veracity.



CHAPTER XVIII. JEPH'S GOOD FORTUNE.

"Still sun and rain made emerald green the loveliest fields on earth, And gave the type of deathless hope, the little shamrock, birth." IRISH BALLAD.

The King's visit left traces. Emlyn had become far more restless and consciously impatient of the dullness and seclusion of the Hermit's Gulley. Not only did she, as before, avail herself of every pretext for going into the village, or for making expeditions to Bristol, but she openly declared the place a mere grave, intolerable to live in, and she confided to Jerusha that the King had declared that it was a shame to hide her there—such charms were meant for the world.

The only way of getting into the world that occurred to her was going into service at Bristol, and she talked of this whenever she specially hated her spinning, or if Patience ventured to complain of her gadding about, gossipping with Nanny Pierce or Kitty Blane, or getting all the young lads in Elmwood round her, to be amused and teased by her lively rattle.

Patience began to be decidedly of opinion that it would be much better for all parties that the girl should be under a good mistress. Both she and Rusha were over sixteen years old; and though it was much improved, the house was hardly fit for so many inhabitants, and both Goody Grace and Dame Blane had told Patience that it would be better, both for the awkward Rusha and the gay Emlyn, if they could have some household training.

Mistress Elmwood, at the Hall, had noted the family at church, and observed their perfect cleanliness and orderliness, and it was intimated that at the Ladyday hiring, she would take Rusha among her maidens.

Shy Rusha cried a great deal, and wished Emlyn would go instead, but Mrs. Elmwood would not have hired that flighty damsel on any account, and Emlyn was sure it would be but mopish work to live under a starched old Puritan. Mrs. Lightfoot was therefore applied to, to find a service for Emlyn Gaythorn, and she presently discovered one Mistress Sloggett, a haberdasher's wife of wealth and consideration, who wanted a young maidservant.

Emlyn was presented to her by the bakester, undertook for everything, and was hired by the twelvemonth, going off in high glee at the variety and diversion she expected to enjoy at the sign of the "Sheep and Shears," though clinging with much tenderness to her friends as they parted.

"Remember, Emlyn, this is the home where you will always be welcome," said Stead.

"As if I wanted to remember it," said Emlyn, with her sweet smile. "As if I did not know where be kind hearts."

The hovel seemed greatly deserted when the two young girls were gone. Patience sorely missed Rusha, her diligent little helper, and latterly her companion too; and the lack of Emlyn's merry tongue made all around seem silent and tedious. Steadfast especially missed the girl. Perhaps it was due to the King's gibes that her absence fully opened to him the fact that he knew not how to do without her. After his usual fashion, he kept the discovery to himself, not even talking to Patience about it, being very shamefaced at the mere thought, which gave a delicious warmth to his heart, though it made him revolve schemes of saving up till he had a sufficient sum, with which to go to the squire and propose to meet him half-way in rebuilding the old house; not such an expensive matter as it would be in these days. There, in full view of all that passed down Elmwood Lane, Emlyn could not complain of solitude, he thought! But there was this difficulty in the way, that Jephthah had never resigned his claims as eldest son, and might come home at any time, and take possession of all the little farm at which Steadfast had worked for seven years.

The war was over, and nothing had been heard of Jeph, except the king's apocryphal history, since his visit after the taking of Bristol. Patience had begun to call him "poor Jeph," and thought he must have been killed, but Stead had ascertained that the army had not been disbanded, and believed him still to be employed.

At length, one market day, Mrs. Lightfoot told him, "There has been one asking for you, Kenton, Seth Coleman, the loriner's son, that went soldiering when your brother did. He landed last week from Ireland with a wooden leg, and said he, 'Where shall I come to the speech of one Steadfast Kenton? I have a greeting from his brother, the peculiarly favoured,' or some such word, 'Jephthah Kenton, who told me I should hear tidings of him from Mrs. Bakester Lightfoot, at the sign of the "Wheatsheaf."' I told him where you abode, and he said he knew as much from your brother, but he could not be tramping out to Elmwood on a wooden leg. So says I 'I will send Steadfast Kenton to you next market day.' You will find him at the sign at the 'Golden Bridle,' by the Wharf Stairs."

Stead had no sooner disposed of his wares than he went in search of the loriner's shop, really one for horse furniture. There was a bench outside, looking out on the wharf and shipping, and on it was seated the returned soldier, with a little party round him, to whom he was expounding what sounded more military than religious:

"And so, the fort having been summoned and quarter promised, if so be no resistance were made, always excepting Popish priests, and—Eh! What now? Be you an old neighbour? I don't remember your face."

"I have seen you, though. I am Jephthah Kenton's brother, that you asked for."

"I mind you were but a stripling in those days, and yet in gross darkness. Yea, I have a letter for thee from my comrade, who is come to high preferment."

"Jeph!"

"Yea, things have prospered with him. He was a serjeant even before we sailed for Ireland, and there he did such good service in hunting out Popish priests and rebels in their lurking places in the bogs and mountains, that the Lord General hath granted him the land that he took with his sword and his bow, even a meadow land fat and fertile, Ballyshea by name, full of the bulls of Bashan, goodly to look at. And to make all sure, he hath taken to wife the daughter of the former owner of the land a damsel fair to look upon."

"Jeph! But sure—the Irish are Papists."

"Not the whole of them. There are those that hold to Prelacy and call themselves King's men, following the bloody and blinded Duke of Ormond. Of them was this maid's father, whom we slew at the taking of Clonmel, where I got this wound and left my good right leg. So is the race not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but time and chance happeneth to all. When I could hobble about once more on crutches, I found that the call had come to divide and possess the gate of the enemy, and that the meads of Ballyshea had fallen to Serjeant Kenton. Moreover, in the castle hard by, dwelt the widow and her daughter, who cried to General Lambert for their land, and what doth he say to Jephthah, but 'Make it sure, Kenton. Take the maid to wife, and so none will disturb you in the fair heritage.' Yea, and mine old comrade would have me sojourn with him till I was quite restored, so far as a man with one limb short may be. I tell you 'tis a castle, man."

"Our Jeph lord of a castle?"

"Aye, even so. Twice as big as Elmwood Hall, if half were not in ruins, and the other half the rats run over like peas out of a bag. While as to the servants, there are dozens of them, mostly barefoot and in rags, who will run at the least beck from the old mistress or the young mistress, though they scowl at the master. But he is taking order with them, and teaching them who is to be obeyed."

"Then our Jephthah is a great man?"

"You may say that—a bigger man than the squire at Elmwood, or at Leigh I can tell you. Only I would give all that bare mountain and bog, full of wild, Popish, red-haired kernes for twenty yards in a tidy street at Bristol, with decent godly folk around me. Murdering or being murdered, I have marvelled more than once whether the men of Israel were as sick of it in Canaan as I was at Drogheda, but the cry ever was, 'Be not slack in the work.' But I will bring you Jephthah's letter. He could not write when he went off, but he could not be a serjeant without, so we taught him—I and Corporal Faith-Wins."

Jephthah's handwriting was of a bold description doing honour to his tutors, but the letter was very brief, though to the purpose—

"Dear Brothers and Sisters,

"This is to do you, to wit, that by the grace of Heaven on my poor endeavours I am come to high preferment. A goodly spoil hath fallen unto me, namely, the castle and lands of Ballyshea, and therewith the daughter of the owner, deceased, by name Ellen Roche, whom I have espoused in marriage, and am bringing to the light of truth. I have castle, lands, flocks and herds, men-servants and maid-servants in abundance, and I give thanks to Him who hath rewarded His servant.

"Therefore I wholly resign to you, my brethren, Steadfast and Benoni, any rights of heirship that may be mine in respect of the farmstead of Elmwood, and will never, neither I nor my heirs, trouble you about it further. Yet if Ben, or my sisters Patience and Jerusha, be willing to cross over to me in this land of promise they shall be kindly welcome, and I shall find how to bestow them well in marriage. Mine old comrade, Seth Coleman, will tell them how to reach the Castle of Ballyshea, and how to find safe convoy, and tell you more of the estate wherewith it has pleased Heaven to reward my poor services.

"And so commending you to His holy keeping, no more from your loving brother,

"JEPHTHAH KENTON."

The spelling of this was queer, even according to the ways of the time, but it was not hard to understand, and it might well fill Steadfast with amazement.

He longed to share the tidings with Emlyn, but he did not feel as if it would be right to let anyone hear before Patience. Only as he went back and called again at Mrs. Lightfoot's for his basket, she asked whether he had found Seth Coleman, and if his brother had come to such preferment as was reported.

"Yea," said Steadfast, "he hath a grant of land, and a castle, and a wife."

"Eh, now! Lack-a-day! 'Tis alway the most feather-pated that fly highest."

Cromwell's Ironsides feather-pated! But that did not trouble Steadfast, who all the way home, as he rode his donkey, was thinking of the difference it made in his prospects, and in what he had to offer Emlyn to be able to feel his tenure so much more secure.

Patience and Ben listened in utter amazement ending in a not complimentary laugh on the part of the former. "Our Jeph lord of a castle? I'd like to see him."

"Would you? He has a welcome and a husband ready for you and Rusha both?"

"D'ye think I would go and leave you for Jeph, if he were lord of ten castles?"

And Ben, whose recollections of Jeph were very dim, exclaimed, "Lord of a castle! I shall have a crow over Nick Blane now!"