CHAPTER XIX

Escaping from the Enemy

'Are we quite safe now, Betsy?'

'Yes, my dear mistress, we have got clean away from that gloomy Hall, with its half-wild dependents, who would like to have torn us to pieces I verily believe, and it's a comfort to think that our Sir Hubert gave that wicked Sir Claudius a mark to remember him by that will last all his lifetime----'

'What? What was that?' I asked feebly. For, though conscious now, I was feeling very weak, and the litter in which I lay swayed as it was being borne over bumpy, uneven roads.

'He cut off his left hand with one blow of his sword,' cried my woman exultingly, 'so that hand will never do any more mischief, mistress!'

'Poor wretch!' exclaimed I, shuddering.

'Poor, do you call him? It is not a vile enough word. Why, mistress, it was with that hand he boxed the ear of that poor lad who spoke to you in the chapel, thereby probably making him deaf for life.'

'Oh, I hope not! Poor Saul!'

'I have known of hard blows on the ear like that making people deaf for life,' continued Betsy volubly, 'and it is a cruel shame to give them.'

'Indeed it is! Oh! Betsy, how glad I am that I have escaped from the power of that man!' And I thanked God in my heart for my safe deliverance.

'I am deeply thankful, mistress,' and the tears came into Betsy's eyes, for she had a warm heart, full of affection for me and my brothers, having been our nurse for years before she became my maid.

'Where are we now, Betsy?' I asked presently, after trying in vain to piece together the disjointed fragments of events of which I had been conscious since the interrupted wedding in the chapel at Crossley Hall.

'On the high road to Brighthelmstone. Travelling as fast as we can towards our dear home!' cried Betsy delightedly. 'We have had enough of the great world, you and I, mistress, to last us all our lives. When Sir Hubert came hastily into Sion House that day you disappeared, declaring you had been kidnapped, and demanded a litter, horses and men, aye, and me also to ride inside and nurse you if you were ill--that he might go after you--Lady Jane saw him herself, and promised everything he asked. Then she added that she was herself expecting hourly to be sent for to the Tower. "It is not likely," she said, "that my cousin, Queen Mary, will suffer me to be at large, when my freedom might, any day, cause danger to herself; therefore if you succeed, as I trust you will, in rescuing my dear Margery, I pray you take her to her father's house, where she will be safer than either here at Sion House, or with me in the Tower. For my own sake," she said, "I would fain have her near me, but for hers I wish her down at Brighthelmstone with her own people."'

'Did Lady Jane say that?'

'Yes, mistress; I remember every word, and Sir Hubert agreed that he would take you to your home. He is therefore doing so.'

'Where is he?' I asked quickly.

'He is riding on before our litter, to see if the road is clear and safe.'

'I would fain speak with him.'

'Mistress, you cannot just now. He is out of sight and hearing. "Take care of your mistress," he said to me, "and I will ride on in front." There are other riders behind. We are well protected now. It was such a job to get hold of you, mistress,' continued Betsy, 'that we don't mean to lose you again. There was much fighting to do before we could get into the Hall, I can tell you; but, first of all, we found the Duke of Northumberland's men were not much good, and we had to travel ever so far to get some picked men, quite gentlemen some of them, to come over and help.'

'Then Sir Hubert never was a prisoner at Crossley Hall?' asked I, thinking of the man in the dungeon, and of all that I had gone through in order to get him liberated.

Betsy laughed at the idea. 'Sir Hubert said he had had a narrow escape of being taken prisoner when you were,' she said. 'There were six to one, but he fought valiantly, and they could not take him, though he was unable to rescue you.'

Lying there in the litter, listening to Betsy's talk and looking on her familiar face, whilst the sweet country air fanned me pleasantly, bringing with it, too--or I could fancy so--a breath of the salt sea air in which I had grown up and lived most of my life, I could almost fancy that the Wheel of Time had gone back a little, and I was once more in my father's litter with Betsy, leaving home for the first time for Sion House and the service of Lady Jane Grey. I had to pull myself together before I could realize that far from being in my father's litter going to Isleworth, I was in one of the Duke of Northumberland's litters, returning in it to my old home.

'You will like to see Master Jack and Master Hal again,' said Betsy cheerily, and of course your father and Master Montgomery too, not to mention Timothy and John and Joseph.'

'Yes, that I shall,' I said, but half absently, for though I was returning to them, there was another love drawing my heart away from them back to the more hazardous life in the great metropolis, wherein was my sweet mistress, Lady Jane. 'For my own sake, I would rather have her with me,' those had been her words about me, and it needed not long thinking about them on my part to make of them my law. Lady Jane would rather have me with her, therefore I must go to Lady Jane. I said so to Betsy, much to her amazement and consternation.

'But, mistress, dear mistress, consider,' she cried. 'Before this she has probably been taken to the Tower, where she will be a prisoner. It will be very different from what it was before,' she continued. 'She will be in another part of the Tower, away from the Royal Palace that she was in before, and they will never allow you to go to her, or, once you go,' she went on inconsequently, 'you will never be permitted to return. Your life won't be safe for a minute, when once you are amongst the State prisoners. They will burn you alive and behead you,' she continued wildly, tears rolling down her face at the idea, 'and then where will you be, my sweet, precious Mistress Margery?' and she caught hold of my hands as if she would keep me away from the Tower by main force.

And then my litter suddenly stopped, and Sir Hubert rode alongside, and, stooping over his horse's head, looked earnestly into my face.

'My dearest,' he said to me, lifting his hat with one hand and reining in his horse with the other, 'what is the matter?'

I told him that he was taking me in the wrong direction, for that I desired, above all things, to return to Lady Jane.

'Well, that is what I desire too,' he said instantly, 'or at least I wish to be in the neighbourhood of her father, that we may together discuss and plan measures----' He stopped short, looking suspiciously around. 'You understand?' he said.

Yes, I understood. He was still not without hope that Mary might be dethroned, and Lady Jane reinstated as Queen. What it is to be young! All things seem possible to the very young, especially when they are greatly desired.

'But Lady Jane Grey wished me to take you to your home, Margery,' he said, 'and indeed I know you would be safer there.'

'Yes,' said I, 'but that does not matter.'

'Would you not like to be back with Jack and Hal and your father?' he asked.

For a moment--I was so young and they were so very dear--I wavered. Then I made answer stoutly, 'I want, _above all things, to return to my dear lady. If you love me, dearest, you will take me to her._'

'And if she chides me for disobedience?'

'I will bear the blame,' I said; 'I will bear all the blame.'

We had a little more talk about it, and then, the language of our hearts being one and the same, straightway turned about and retraced our steps, making a detour, that we might avoid the dangerous neighbourhood of Crossley Hall.

A couple of hours later, Sir Hubert, who had been riding on before, returned to us, saying anxiously, 'Margery, we are pursued. Quite a large company of horsemen have appeared in sight from the direction of Crossley Hall, and they are gaining upon us.'

'Oh,' cried I, 'what shall we do? It would be worse than death to fall again into the hands of Sir Claudius!'

'You never shall,' said Sir Hubert, 'whilst I live and a strong arm can prevent it.'

At that moment a solitary horseman, riding towards us from the opposite direction, stopped short, and, looking hard at us, exclaimed--

'Why, is it thou again? And still pursued by the rabble? Thou wilt be killed yet!'

'Master Jack Fish!' exclaimed I. 'You remember him, Hubert, and what a good friend he was to us when we were in that shed?'

'Oh, yes, I remember him perfectly,' and my dear one greeted him in a very friendly way, rapidly explaining the situation.

'Thou art in great danger,' said Jack Fish gravely. 'Thine enemy will stick at nothing to be revenged on thee. I caught a good glimpse of his horsemen when I was on that hill, and there are four times as many of them as there are of thee.'

'What _shall_ we do?' I exclaimed.

Jack Fish looked at me pityingly. 'Madam,' he said, 'thou in that litter art in the position of the greatest danger. Thy litter is a target towards which all will aim. Sir Knight, is it absolutely impossible to separate the lady from her litter?'

'Well, no,' replied Sir Hubert. 'Margery'--he turned to me--'can you ride well? Could you accompany us on horseback?'

'Yes. That I could!' I exclaimed. 'I have been used to riding from my babyhood. A man's saddle? Oh, yes, of course I can ride on that. I can ride without a saddle, if you like,' and I thought of the many gallops across the downs I had had in the old days with Hal and Jack.

'Hurrah! Bravo!' cried my lover triumphantly. 'Now we shall circumvent the enemy!' He was about to choose me a horse, when the sight of Betsy reminded him of her, and he asked, 'Your maid? Can she ride?'

'That I can, sir,' Betsy answered for herself. 'Am I not a farmer's daughter?'

'You will do well,' exclaimed Master Jack Fish, and with that, setting spurs to his horse, he galloped off, not caring for our pursuers to see him with us.

'He is a shrewd man and a good friend,' observed Sir Hubert. Then he quickly arranged that Betsy and I should ride two of his men's horses, whilst their owners rode behind two of the other men.

That done, the party broke up. Sir Hubert, accompanied by me and my woman, and followed by half his company, continuing straight forward on the road to London, whilst the other half of the men took the litter in the direction of Guildford.

In this way we fortunately escaped from our would-be captors, who, we afterwards heard, had a sharp encounter with the company escorting the litter, in which they were only beaten off with tremendous difficulty and the loss of the litter, which fell into their hands.