Part 26 (2/2)

”And waiting for that, she may well be done to death within those walls, as I should have been had I not fled. I am in trouble of heart anent my sister. I pray she may find her way to me yet in the free forest!”

Philip started and looked surprised.

”Is there likelihood of that?”

”I know not. I bid her come if our father should grow more harsh, and told her where I likeliest might be found. I purpose to dwell for a while myself in the forest, albeit thou wouldst mock me if thou knewest the wherefore.”

”To search for the lost treasure, I doubt not,” said Philip with a smile, remembering the talk of the autumn previous. ”Marry thou hast my best wishes for a happy quest. But what couldst thou do with a tender maid out in the woods with thee?”

”I scarce know that myself; but anything would be better than life with a madman--as I trow our father is like to become an he change not his habit of life. Belike I would take her to mine uncle on the bridge; yet perchance he would not thank me for adding to his charges.

”If we had other relatives--”

”Why, and so ye have, even as we have. Hast never heard of my Lady Humbert and Mistress Dowsabel Wyvern? They must be kinsfolk of thine as well as of ours, and they dwell not very far distant from here, albeit I myself have never visited them.”

Cuthbert raised his head and looked eagerly at Philip.

”I would know more of that,” he said.

”It is not much I can tell thee. This Lady Humbert is a widow, and is sister to that Gertrude Wyvern who was my grandam and thy aunt. Mistress Dowsabel is her younger sister; and albeit they are both now of a good old age, they dwell together, with only servants for company, in a house thou wouldst have pa.s.sed on the road to London hadst thou not taken the lonelier way across the heath. My father and mother go each year to see after their welfare, and a letter comes now and again from them with greetings or questions. We of the younger generation have never been to visit them, since they are too old to wish for the presence of the young, and love not to see the changeless current of their lives interrupted. I remember that of old, when we were in disgrace for some prank, our grandam would shake her head at us and vow we should be sent to her sister Dowsabel for chastis.e.m.e.nt, and stay with her till we learned better manners. So we have grown up in the fancy that these kinswomen be something stern and redoubtable ladies. Nevertheless, if thou wast to put thy sister beneath their care, I trow they would receive her with kindness and treat her well, and she would scarce regret the Gate House were the captivity never so hard. Nor would Nicholas Trevlyn be like to seek her there, though at the Chase he would find her at once, were we to strive to aid her flight as we aided thine.”

Cuthbert saw this plainly, and asked a few more eager questions about these ladies and where they might be found. He hardly knew whether or not he expected Petronella to flee away to him, but at least it would do no harm to be prepared in case she did so.

Philip told him all he knew, which was not much. The house would be easily found, as it stood upon the highroad just a mile from a large village, its gates opening straight upon the road, although at the back were gardens and pleasaunces and a clear trout stream. It seemed to Cuthbert as he listened that such a place as this might prove a safe haven of refuge for his sister should one be needed, and he resolved that if she once came to him he would persuade her to place herself beneath the protection of these ladies.

He would well have liked to see her again, to have whispered something of this new plan into her ears. But though he lingered much about the house during the two short weeks he spent at the Chase, he saw no glimpse of his sister, and he did not dare to summon her out to meet him at night, lest haply the suspicions of the grim old tyrant should be aroused.

Leaving Philip fully determined to see Nicholas Trevlyn ere long, to lay before him his formal proposal for Petronella's hand, and confident that all at the Chase would befriend her as far as it was possible; Cuthbert, afraid to linger longer in the immediate vicinity of the Gate House, took his departure for the forest, resolved to give himself over heart and soul to the search after the missing treasure, and not to give it up until every nook and corner of the pixies' dell had been subjected to the closest scrutiny.

It was easy to obtain from Philip all such tools as would be needful for the task of excavation. Although the young man himself had small hopes of Cuthbert's success, he was interested in spite of himself in the proposed plan, and would have been more so had he known how much had been already discovered. But Cuthbert kept much of that to himself, not willing that tattling tongues should spread the rumour. Only to real believers in the hidden treasure did he care to speak of the gipsy's strange words and the visit to the wise woman of Budge Row. Philip, he thought, would smile, and perhaps he would speak of the matter to his father, who in turn might name it to some one else, and so it might come round, through the gipsy spies and watchers, to the ears of Long Robin himself. That, as Cuthbert well knew, would be well-nigh destruction to all his cherished hopes; yet one who believed not would smile at his fears, and could scarce be expected to observe the needful caution.

As Cuthbert started for his nine miles' tramp in the cool of the evening, with his tools slung across his shoulders, he was glad to think that he had resisted the temptation to speak openly of this matter to any but Petronella and Kate. With them he well knew the secret was safe, for they entertained for Long Robin just the same suspicious fear as he did himself, and their lips were sealed even as his own.

The walk was nothing for his strong young limbs; but as he approached the lonely dell, he instinctively slackened his speed, and proceeded with greater caution. The thick growth of the trees made the place dark in spite of the moon, which hung low in the sky and shone between the trees in long silvery beams; and the tangled path which once had led to the forest well had been long overgrown with a ma.s.s of bramble and underwood, through which it was hard to force a way.

But Cuthbert cautiously proceeded, listening intently for any sounds of life to indicate the presence of Long Robin, the only being likely to be near at such an hour; but all appeared to be intensely still, and presently he commenced his cautious descent into the dell itself, and at last stood beside the old stone wall that guarded the mouth of the well.

Cuthbert had heard something of that well since he had been at his uncle's house. Some of the old servants at the Chase knew the forest well, and he had been told the story of the pixies' dell: how it had once been a noted spot in the forest, and how travellers turned aside to drink the waters, which were not only fresh and clear and cold, even on the most sultry summer's day, but were reported to possess healing properties, especially if taken at certain hours of the night and in certain phases of the moon. Long ago there had been a monastery near the well, and the monks had dispensed the waters to the applicants who came. But the monastery had fallen into ruins and had disappeared, and after that the pixies were given the credit of the healing waters. People came to drink them, though less frequently than before; and as the place grew more lonely and deserted, rumours began to float about that the pixies were inimical to man, and that the waters no longer possessed their old power. Later on still, a more terrible thing was discovered: it was said that it was death to approach that dell and drink the waters. Men's bones had been found in great numbers close about that spot, and it was plain that they must belong to the unhappy wights who, disregarding cautions, had ventured to the place, and had died before they could get away from thence.

After that, as may well be guessed, no sick folks had cared to trouble the dell again. Travellers made a wide circuit to avoid it, and it was held to be the place of most evil repute in the forest.

All this story was well understood by Cuthbert, who felt no fear of the spot, only a little natural awe as he recollected the deed that had once been done there. The moon was going down as he looked about him; the dark hour before morning was about to fall upon the world. He looked about for a resting place in which to conceal himself till he could commence his search, and found the place he desired in a hollow tree, just beyond the circle of smooth sward that surrounded the well itself.

Plainly this tree had been used before for a like purpose. The leaves had been carefully raked together within, and were covered by a warm rug, in which Cuthbert was not sorry to wrap himself, for the night air was sharp and chilly though the days were hot.

”Long Robin's rug, or I greatly mistake me,” he said with a smile. ”I trow he would be sore amazed were he to come and find me here. Howbeit he would but take me for a pa.s.sing wayfarer, since he knows not my face, and I mis...o...b.. me if he come tonight. He fears too much Joanna's watchful eyes and Miriam's jealous ones. I will sleep in peace till daylight dawns, and then I will begin my search.”

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