Chapter II Sherebiah Shouts
An Angling Story—Old Izaak—Landed—Breakfast—Marlborough’s Smile—The Story of a Potticary—Dosed—On the Horizon—Highwaymen—A Man of Peace—Behind the Scenes—Nos Duo—Promises—Black John Simmons—Sherebiah is Troubled
“’Tis here or hereabouts, baten years ha’n’t tooken my memory. True, feyther o’ mine calls me boy, and so I be to a old aged man like him; but when a man’s comen on forty-four, and ha’ seen summat o’ the world—well,
“‘Man’s life is but vain, for ’tis subject to pain
An’ sorrow, an’ short as a bubble;
’Tis a hodge-podge o’ business, an’ money, an’ care,
An’ care, an’ money, an’ trouble.’
Ay, ’tis so, ’tis so!”
Sherebiah sighed, but the sigh ill became his round, jolly face; it was merely to chime with the words of the song. He was walking, about six o’clock on the morning after the cricket-match, along the bank of a little hill-stream, rod in hand, yet not expecting to halt for a while, for he took no pains to moderate his voice. He was not alone. His companion was the youth who had won the match for Winton St. Mary on the previous day—Harry Rochester, the parson’s son. Each carried a rod—the huge clumsy rod of those days, nearly seventeen feet in length; each was laden with wallet, landing-net, and other apparatus; and in fact they had already had an hour’s sport with ground-bait, having risen from their beds soon after three on this ideal angler’s morning. A haze lay over the ground, and a light rain was falling.
Sherebiah was several yards ahead, scanning the banks. His voice sank a little as he repeated the lines:
“’Tis a hodge-podge o’ business, an’ money, an’ care,
An’ care, an’ money, an’ trouble.”
“Cheer up!” said Harry, behind him. “I like the second verse best, Sherry:
“‘But we’ll take no care when the weather proves fair,
Nor will we vex now though it rain—
He was interrupted by the sudden halt of Sherebiah. The man had swung round; his lips were shot out in the motion of shooing, a warning finger was held up. Harry’s voice died away, and he hastened to his companion’s side.
“Yonder’s the spot,” said Sherebiah in a whisper, pointing to a large pool, shaded with willows, some thirty yards ahead. “Mum’s the word! They be sharp-eared, they trouts. ’Tis there I took ten lusty nibblers, ten year agoo come Michaelmas. Faith, ’twas all I could do to carry ’em; ay, and I shouldn’ ha’ got ’em home but for Tom Dorrell, t’ carrier from Salisbury, who came trundlen along in his wagon. He be dead an’ gone, poor soul, as must we all.”
“And what did you do with them?” asked Harry with a smile.
Sherebiah was famous for his angling stories, and they had perhaps as much foundation as most. No one in the country-side knew the ways of the trout as he did; but he was equally at home in trolling for jack or pike, roving for perch, and sniggling for eels. None could match his knowledge of the flies in their several seasons: the hour of the day at which each is most killing; the merits of the silver twist hackle and the lady-fly, whether for dapping or whipping; when to use the black gnat, when the blue; under what conditions of the evening sky the shyest trout will rise to a red spinner. And who could tie a fly like Sherebiah Minshull? Many a time Harry had examined his rich store of materials—as varied as the contents of a witch’s cauldron: feathers of every bird that flies, manifold silks and wires and hooks, wax and needles, hog’s down and squirrel’s fur. Many a time had he watched him dress a fly and thread a bait, and admired his dexterous whipping of the streams.
“What did I do wi’ ’em?” Sherebiah had sat down with legs far apart, and was carefully selecting a fly from his case. He spoke always in a whisper. “Well, ’tis ten year since, and my memory bean’t what it was; but now I mind on’t, I gi’ one to Tom carrier for his lift, and a couple to miller up by Odbury, and one to Susan Poorgrass at Sir Godfrey’s—I was a-courten then; her wouldn’t ha’ me, thank the Lord!—and a couple to Ned Greenhay, Sir Godfrey’s keeper as was, for a brace o’ leverets; and to please feyther o’ mine I took three up to the Hall. Zooks! and small thanks I got, for old Squire hisself come to the door, and gi’ me a douse, he did; said if I didn’t find summat better to do than go traipsen the country-side, poachen or wuss, he’d commit me for a rogue and vagabond. An’ th’ old curmudgeon kept the fish; ay, he did so!—Ah! ha’ got it; ’tis a fly that cost me more time in the maken than a dozen others; a beauty, to be sure; eh, Master Harry?”
He proceeded to put it on his hook. It was an artificial oak-fly, blue, green, brown, and orange so cunningly mingled that no trout could fail to be deceived.
“We’ll now see some sport,” continued Sherebiah, still in a whisper, as he prepared to cast. “I can’t abide bait-fishen; sport, i’ faith! ’tis mere bludgeon-play. True, it fills the pot, but there’s no pleasure in ’t. ’Tis no pastime for a true bob.”
“Why, Sherry, ’twas only yestere’en I was reading in a most excellent book of angling by Master Izaak Walton, and he, it seems, held little to the fly. His discourse is in the main of bait.”
“Why, there ’tis. I met Master Walton once, a-fishen in the Itchen above Winchester—a quaint man, with a good breast for a song, for all he was ripe for the grave. Myself I was but twenty or so, he a man of fourscore and upward; ay, a fine hale old man, wi’ a store o’ memories. We fell into talk; a’ told me how a’ once rid to Lunnon wi’ a rich jewel o’ King Charles’s in his doublet; ay, he was a royal man, wi’ a jolly red face, but no harm in un, not a whit; and learned, too—but no angler. No, faith, no angler, for a’ talked o’ fishen down stream, a’ did, when ne’er a child but knows fish lie wi’ their heads up stream. Ye cotch fish as ’ee do Frenchmen, from behind! Now, hook’s ready. Mum, Master Harry, while I cast.”
He dropped his fly deftly into the still pool, watching it with keen eyes and pursed lips. Meanwhile Harry had chosen an orle fly, and made his cast a little lower down. The anglers were silent for some minutes.
“What’s that?” asked Harry suddenly, looking up as a distant sound of wood-chopping reached his ears.
“Mum, boy!” whispered Sherebiah in reply. “There, I beg pardon, Master Harry, but you’ve scared away a samlet just as he opened his jaws. That? ’Tis Simon forester, belike, fellen Sir Godfrey’s timber. Now, a still tongue——”
He broke off, rose, and followed his line stealthily for a yard or two. The surface of the water was disturbed, and Harry caught a glimpse of a gleaming side. There was a splash; the rod bent; then Sherebiah hastened his steps as the fish went away with a rush.
“He’s a-showen fight,” whispered Sherry. “Whoa! he’s sounded, Master Harry; a big un. Pray the tackle may hold! Ah! he’s clear, and off again! Whoa! whoa! Nay, my pretty, ’ee may fight, but I’ll land ’ee.”
For ten minutes the contest continued; then the angler got in his line slowly, and beckoned to Harry to assist him. The fish was carefully drawn in; Harry stooped with his net at the critical moment, and with a sudden heave landed a fine four-pounder, which he slipped into Sherebiah’s creel.
“That’s the way on’t, Master Harry,” said Sherebiah contentedly. “Had no luck yourself, eh? What be ’ee a-fishen wi’?”
“An orle.”
“Ah, ’tis an hour or two too early in the day for that, mebbe. Still, these waters of Sir Godfrey bean’t often fished since young Master Godfrey went to Cambridge college, and the trout mayn’t be over squeamish. Stick to ’t!”
An hour passed, and both anglers were well satisfied. Sherebiah’s fly proved irresistible, either from its cunning make or the wary skill with which he whipped the stream. Four fat trout had joined the first in his basket; two had rewarded Harry’s persistence; then he laid down his rod and watched with admiration the delicate casts of his companion. Sherebiah landed his sixth. The haze having now disappeared, and the sun growing hot, he wound up his line and said:
“Rain afore seven, fine afore ’leven. I be mortal peckish, Master Harry; what may ’ee have in your basket, now?”
“Powdered beef, I think, Sherry; and Polly put in a cate or two and some radishes, and a bottle of cider; plain fare, you see.”
“Well, hunger’s the best saace, I b’lieve. We poor folks don’t need to perk up our appetites. I warrant, now, that mighty lord we saw yesterday would turn up his nose at powdered beef. Fine kickshawses a’ had at Sir Godfrey’s, no doubt. To think o’ such a mighty lord, the Queen’s purse-bearer an’ all, bein’ kept in a little small village by rust or dry-rot, just like a ordinary man! Old Squire would ha’ liked to gi’ him a bed, I reckon; but Sir Godfrey were aforehand, an’ there he lies till this mornen: axle was to be mended by six, if Lumpy had to work all night to finish the job. Med I axe ’ee a question, Master Harry? Do ’ee think that shinen piece a’ flung to feyther were his own, or out o’ Queen’s purse?”
Harry laughed.
“Lord Godolphin doesn’t go about the country with the Queen’s purse slung at his waist, Sherry. What he meant was that he was Lord Treasurer, the Queen’s chief minister, the man who rules the country, you know.”
“Well, now, if I didn’t think it’d be folly to carry the Queen’s purse loose about the country! Then ’tis Lord Godolphin says we’re to fight the French?”
“Yes, he and my lord Marlborough between them.”
“Ah! there ’tis. My lord Marlborough bean’t free with his money like t’other lord. He wouldn’t ha’ given old feyther o’ mine nothen. Why, I was at Salisbury in ’88 when my lord—Lord Churchill he was then, to be sure—was there to meet King Willum, and I held his horse for ’n, and he gi’ me—what do ’ee think he gi’ me, Master Harry?”
“Well?”
“Nowt but a smile! What med ’ee think o’ that for a lord? ‘Thank ’ee, my man,’ says he, and puts his foot in the stirrup and shows his teeth at me, and rides off! Lord! Now t’other one, the Lord Godolphin, he is a lord, to be sure, a fine free-handed gentleman, though he ha’n’t got such fine teeth. I like a lord to be a lord, I do.”
“My lord Marlborough is indeed rather close-fisted, they say.”
“Ay, but I ha’ knowed a wuss. Did ever I tell ’ee of Jacob Spinney the potticary? I was a growen lad, and feyther o’ mine wanted to put me to a trade. So he bound me prentice to Jacob Spinney, that kept a potticary’s shop by Bargate at S’thampton. Zooks! Jacob was a deceiver, like his namesake in the Book. A’ promised feyther he’d gi’ me good vittles and plenty on ’em, bein’ a growen lad; but sakes, I never got no meat save at third boilen; ’twas like eatin’ leather. A’ said I was growen too fast, a’ did, and he’d keep me down. Pudden—I never put my lips to pudden for two year, not once. I took down shutters at zix i’ the mornen, and put ’em up at eight o’ nights; betwixt and between I was pounden away at drugs, and carryen parcels, and scrubben floors and nussen mistress’ babby: ay, what med ’ee think o’ that? If so happened I broke a bottle, or overslept five minutes—oons! there was master a-strappen me to a hook in the wall he kept o’ purpose, and layen a birch over my shoulders and keepen me on bread and water or turmuts not fit for a ox. I dwindled crossways to a shadder, Master Harry, I did so, and every week th’ old villain made me write a letter to feyther, sayen as how I was fat and flourishen like a green bay tree. Do what a’ would, however, I growed and growed, at fourteen a long slip of a feller all arms and legs. Two mortal year I put up wi’ un; then I got tired. One day, mistress was out, and I was rollen pills in the little back shop, when master come in. He was in a terrible passion, goodness alone knows what about. He pitched into me for wasten his drugs and eatin’ up all his profits, and hit me with his cane, and sent me spinnen agen the table, and knocked off his best chiney mortar, and there ’twas on the floor, smashed to atomies. Bein’ his own doen, it made his temper wuss, it did, and he caught me by the hair and said he’d skin me. I’ fecks, I were always a man o’ peace, even as a boy, but I’d had long sufferen enough, and now my peaceful blood was up. I wriggled myself free—and there he was, flat on the floor, and me a-sitten on him. He hollered and cussed, for all he was a Puritan; and, haven respect unto my neighbours, I stuffed a handkercher into his mouth. There I sits, a-thinken what to do wi’ un. ’Twas in for a penny in for a pound wi’ me then; I’d have to run, ‘dentures or no ’dentures, and it seemed fair to have my pen’orth afore I went. There was that hook I knowed so well, and that strap hangen still and loose: ‘I’ll gi’ un a taste o’ the birch he be so uncommon fond on,’ thinks I. So I hoists un up, and soon has un strapped ready; but looken at un I thinks to myself: ‘You be a poor wamblen mortal arter all, skinny for all the pudden you eat. I’ll ha’ mercy on your poor weak flesh.’ Besides, I had another notion. So I casts un loose and sits un on a chair and straps un to chair-back, hands to sides.
“You med have heard of Jacob Spinney’s famous mixture for pimples? Well, ’twas knowed all over Hants and Wilts. ’Twas a rare sight o’ market days to see the farmers’ wives a-troopen into the shop for bottles o’ the mixture. But th’ odd thing was, Spinney hisself was owner of a fair pimpled face, yet never did I know un take a dose o’ his own firm cure. ‘I pity ’ee,’ says I to un, as he sat strapped to the chair; ‘poor feller, wi’ all those pimples. Shall have a dose, poor soul.’ Many’s the bottle I’d made up: ’twas brimstone and powder o’ crab and gentian root in syrup. Well, I mixed a dose all fresh afore his eyes, and got a long wooden spoon, and slipped the handkercher out o’ his mouth and the dose in. The ungrateful feller spets it out and begins to holler again; so in goes the handkercher, and says I: ‘Ye don’t know what’s for your own good. Bean’t it tasty enough? Ah, Master Spinney, often and often ’ee’ve physicked me; what’s good for me without pudden will be better for ’ee with; you shall have a dose.’ So I made un a dose o’ senna and jalap and ipecacuan, but I was slow with the handkercher, and afore I could get the spoon in he had his teeth clinched tight. But I hadn’t nussed the babby for nothen. I ups with finger and thumb and pinches his nose; he opens his mouth for breath, and in goes spoon, and sputter as he med he had to swaller, he did.
“Ah, I was wild and headstrong in they young coltish days. I bean’t so fond o’ pudden now. Not but what they mixtures did Jacob Spinney a world o’ good, for his next prentice had a easier time nor me, steppen into his master’s business when he was laid in churchyard. I got no good on ’em, to be sure, for I had to run away and try another line o’ life, and ha’ been a rollen-stone ever since. Ay well, ’tis all one to a man o’ peace.”
During his narrative the breakfast had been finished.
“Well, Sherry, when I’m out of sorts I’ll come to you,” said Harry, rising. “Now, while you pack up, I’ll go a stroll up the hillside; there’ll be a good view now the day is clearing, and maybe I’ll get a glimpse of Salisbury spire.”
He left the river-bank and strolled leisurely up a gentle ascent, which gradually became steeper until it terminated somewhat suddenly in a stretch of level ground. Fifty yards from the edge rose a long grassy mound, a well-known landmark in the neighbourhood. It was, in fact, a barrow, dating centuries back into the dim ages—the burial place, perhaps, of British warriors who had fought and fallen in defence of their country against the Roman invader. Harry had always felt a romantic interest in these memorials of the past, and more than once had stood by such a barrow, alone in the moonlight of a summer night, while his imagination called up visions of far-off forgotten things.
He sat down now with his back to the mound, and allowed his eyes to rove over the prospect. Tradition said that three counties were visible from this elevated spot, and on a clear morning like this it seemed likely enough that report said true. Far to the left, peeping over the bare contour of Harnham Hill, rose the graceful spire of Salisbury Cathedral, at least fifteen miles away as the crow flies. His eye followed the winding course of the little stream below him, losing it here and there behind some copse or knoll, tracing it again to its junction with a larger stream, till this in its turn was lost to view amid the distant elm-bordered meadows. Nearer at hand he saw the old Roman road, grass-grown and silent now, bounding the park of Sir Godfrey Fanshawe, crossing the stream by an ancient bridge, and running into the London road at some invisible point to the right. It was a very pleasing prospect, brilliant beneath the cloudless sky, and freshened by the early morning showers.
As he looked along the forsaken highway, once trodden perhaps by the legions of Constantine the Great, his glance was momentarily arrested by a small moving speck in the distance. “Some wagon from one of Sir Godfrey’s home farms,” he thought. It was approaching him, for it passed out of sight into a clump of trees, then reappeared, and was again hidden by an intercepting ridge. The road was downhill; in fifteen or twenty minutes, perhaps, the wagon would pass beneath him, at a point nearly three-quarters of a mile away, where the highway skirted a belt of trees perched on the side of a steep declivity. Between him and the road lay a ditch which, as he knew, was apt in winter-time to overflow on to the meadows and the lower parts of the track, making a sticky swamp of the chalky soil. But it was dry now, and the floodings were only indicated by the more vivid green of the grass and the tall reeds that filled the hollow on this side. On the other side a strong stone wall edged the road, marking the boundary of Sir Godfrey’s park; it was overhung with elms, from which at this moment Harry saw a congregation of rooks soar away.
Thus idly scanning the roadway, all at once his eye lit upon the figure of a horseman half concealed by the belt of reeds in the hollow. He was motionless; his back was towards Harry, his horse’s head pointing towards the road, from which he was completely screened by the reeds and the willows.
“What is he doing there?” thought Harry. He rose, and walked towards the edge of the descent. Narrowly scanning the brake, he now descried two other horsemen within a few yards of the first, but so well concealed that but for his quickened curiosity he would probably never have discovered them. For all he knew, there might be others. “What is their game?” His suspicion was aroused; the vehicle he had seen approaching was perhaps not a wagon; it might be a chaise belonging to Sir Godfrey; it might be—— “Why, ’tis without a doubt Lord Godolphin himself on his way to London, and coming by the shortest cut.” There was no need for further speculation; in those days the inference was sure: a carriage in the distance, a party of horsemen lurking in a copse by the roadside—— “’Tis highway robbery—ah! the Queen’s purse!”
Harry unconsciously smiled at the thought. His first impulse was to warn the approaching travellers. But the carriage was at present out of sight; he could not make signals, and before he could reach the stretch of road between the ambuscade and their prey, the travellers would certainly be past, while he himself might be seen by the waiting horsemen, and headed off as he crossed a tract of open country. Moving downwards all the time, he in a flash saw all that it was possible to do. The stream passed under the roadway some twenty yards beyond the spot where the horsemen were lying in wait; the banks were reedy, and might screen an approach to the copse beyond the wall. There was a bare chance, and Harry took it.
He raced downhill towards Sherebiah, who was sitting on the bank still, placidly smoking his pipe; landscape had no charm for him.
“Sherry,” said Harry in jerks, “Lord Godolphin or someone is driving down the road; highwaymen hiding in the reeds; in five or six minutes—come, come, we have no time to lose.”
“Then we’ll go home along,” said Sherry, putting his pipe in his pocket as he rose.
“Nonsense! we can’t slink away and leave them to be robbed.” Harry took Sherry by the arm to drag him along.
“What be the good? Fishen-rods bean’t no match for pistols, and bein’ a man o’ peace——”
“Come, I can’t wait. I’ll go alone, then.”
He released the man’s arm and stepped into the stream. Sherebiah hesitated for a moment; then, seeing that Harry was in earnest, he dropped his tackle and strode forward, saying:
“Zooks, not if I knows it! I’m a man o’ peace, sure enough, but fairplay’s a jewel. Have at the villains!”
He followed Harry into the water. Side by side they raced on, dodging the weeds, scrambling over occasional rocks, slipping on the chalky bottom, making at top speed for the bridge. As they approached this they went more slowly, to avoid being heard. Fortunately, at the point where the road crossed the stream there was a line of rocks, over which the water plunged with a rustle and clatter, drowning the sound of their footsteps. They had to stoop low to avoid the moss-grown masonry of the arch; as they emerged on the farther side they heard a muffled exclamation from one of the horsemen, and climbing the steep face of the tree-covered slope towards the wall they heard a shot, then another, mingled with shouts and the dull thuds of horses’ hoofs on the turf-covered road.
On the way Harry had explained his plan in panting whispers. Running along now under cover of the wall, they came opposite to the scene of the ambush.
“Now, Sherry, do your best,” said Harry, as he prepared to mount the wall.
Instantly a new clamour was added to the uproar in the road.
“This way!”
“Shoot ’em!”
“Lash the noddy peaks!”
“Pinch their thropples!”
“Quoit ’em down!”
“Haick! haick!”
By this time Harry was on the wall, by favour of Sherebiah’s strong arm. A slug whizzed past his head and sank with a thud into the trunk of a tree just behind; next moment the horse-pistol from which it had been discharged followed the shot, the butt grazing Harry’s brow. There was no time to take in the details of the scene. Harry made a spring for the masked horseman who had fired at him, two yards from the wall; but the fellow, alarmed by the various shouts and the sudden appearance of Sherebiah at Harry’s side, dug the spurs into his steed’s flanks and galloped off down the road, over the bridge, and out of sight. One of his companions lay motionless on the road; the others had ridden away at the first alarm from the wall.
Harry mopped his brow and looked about him. Lord Godolphin stood upright in the carriage, his lips grimly set, a smoking pistol in his hand. His son was on foot with drawn sword; a postilion was crawling out of the ditch all bemired, pale and trembling.
“Odzooks!” cried my lord, “a welcome diversion!”
He was perfectly cool and collected, though his hat was off and his wig awry. “A thousand thanks, my men. Whew! ’twas in the nick of time. Where are the rest of you?”
“There are no more, my lord,” said Harry, lifting his cap.
“No more! But the shouts, then?—I heard a dozen shouting, at least. Are the rest on the other side of the wall?”
“All on this side, my lord,” said Harry with a smile. “Here is the mob.”
He indicated Sherebiah, who touched his cap and bobbed to his lordship.
Godolphin stared, then chuckled and guffawed.
“Egad! ’tis a rare flam. Frank, this fellow here did it all, shouted for a dozen; by George, ’twas a mighty neat trick! And, by George, I know your face; I saw you yesterday, I believe! What’s your name, man?”
“Sherebiah Stand-up-and-bless Minshull, my lord,” said Sherry, “by the water o’ baptism, your honour, for I was born while old Rowley were in furren parts. If a’d been born two year arter, my lord, I med ha’ been chrisomed wi’ less piety.”
“I remember you, and the old gaffer your father—a fine old fellow. Well, my man, your name suits me better; ’tis for us to stand up and bless, eh, Frank? And here’s a guinea for you.”
Sherebiah put his hands behind him and looked down at the coin in my lord’s hand.
“Nay, nay, my lord,” he said slowly. “True, I did the shouten, or most on’t, but ’twas Master Harry his notion. Pa’son’s son, you see, my lord; know’d all the holy story o’ Gideon; says to me, ‘Sherry,’ says he, ‘shout high and low, bass and tribble, give it tongue,’ says he; and I gi’d it tongue, so I did.”
Both gentlemen laughed heartily.
“I recognize you now,” said my lord, turning to Harry, who looked somewhat embarrassed. “Surely you are the hero of yesterday’s cricket match? You swing a straight bat, my lad, and, stap me! you’ve a quick wit if you devised this late surprise. How came you on the scene?”
“We’d been fishing yonder, my lord, and I chanced to spy your carriage and the villains waiting here, almost at the same time. It was clear what they were about, and as there was no time to warn you we came along the stream, and—Sherry shouted.”
His smile as he said the last words met an answering smile on Lord Godolphin’s face.
“A mighty clever trick indeed—eh, Frank? We’re beholden to you. ’Twas a mere chance that I sent my mounted escort on ahead by the highway to arrange a change of horses, never thinking to be waylaid at this time o’ day.”
“Ay, ’twas the Queen’s purse, my lord,” struck in Sherebiah. “To know Queen’s purse-bearer were a-comen along old road like a common mortal, ’twere too much for poor weak flesh and blood.”
“The ignorant bumpkins mistook your meaning,” said Frank.
“So it appears. But come, you’re the parson’s son, I believe. I forget your name?”
“Harry Rochester, my lord.”
“Going to be a parson yourself, eh?”
“I am going up to Oxford in October, my lord; my father wishes me to take orders.”
“Ah! And your own wish, eh?”
Harry hesitated.
“Come, out with it, my lad.”
“I had thought, my lord, I should like to carry the Queen’s colours; but ’tis a vain thought; my father’s living is small, and——”
“And commissions in the Queen’s army sell high. ’Tis so, indeed. Well, I heard something of your father last night at Sir Godfrey’s; you can’t do better than follow his example. And hark ’ee, if ever you want a friend, when you’ve taken your degrees, you know, come and see me; I owe you a good turn, my lad; and maybe I’ll have a country vicarage at my disposal.”
“Thank you, my lord!”
“And now we must get on. Dickory, you coward, help these two friends of ours to remove that tree. The villains laid their ambush well; you see they felled this larch at an awkward part of the road.”
“And I thowt ’twas Simon forester a-choppen,” said Sherebiah, as he walked towards the tree.
“What shall we do with this ruffian on the road?” said Frank Godolphin. “He appears to be stone dead. ’Twas a good shot, sir.”
“Leave the villain. You’ll lay an information before Sir Godfrey or another of your magistrates, young master parson. Did you recognize any of the gang?”
“No, my lord. I only saw the masked man. Perhaps Sherry was more fortunate.”
“Not me neither,” said Sherebiah hastily. He had gone to the fallen man, looked in his face, and turned him over. “’Twas all too quick and sudden, and my eyes was nigh dazed wi’ shouten.”
“Well, well, Sir Godfrey’s is near at hand; go and inform him, and he will scour the country. We must push on.”
The tree was removed; the bedraggled and crestfallen postilions resumed their saddles, and with a parting salutation my lord drove off. Harry stood looking thoughtfully after the departing carriage.
“Master Harry,” said Sherebiah, coming up to him, “this be a bad business. The man bean’t dead.”
“He’s saved for the hangman, then.”
“Ay, and who med ’ee think he be?”
“You do know him, then! What does this mean, Sherry?”
“Well, I be a man o’ peace, and there’s mischief to come o’ this day’s piece o’ work, sure as I’m Sherebiah Stand-up-and-bless. ’Tis black John Simmons, Cap’n Aglionby’s man.”
“A scoundrel his master may well be rid of.”
“Ay, if the man were dead! But he be alive; the lord didn’t shoot’n at all; ’a fell off his horse and bashed his nob; an’ he’s got a tongue, Master Harry.”
“Well, what then? If he rounds on his fellows, so much the better. What are you afraid of, Sherry?”
“I bean’t afeard, not I; but the Cap’n——”
He paused, and Harry looked at him enquiringly. Sherebiah turned away.
“Ah! little sticks kindle fires, little sticks kindle fires, they do.”