Part 37 (1/2)

As, worn-out, pallid, aching in every limb, he dragged himself wearily forward on hands and knees, it would have been difficult to recognise in this poor, suffering fragment of humanity the brilliant, das.h.i.+ng gentleman of the road, the foppish, light-hearted dandy, whom the countryside had nicknamed Beau Brocade.

The wound in his shoulder, inflamed and throbbing after the breakneck ride from the Court House to the Heath, had caused him almost unendurable agony, against which he had at first resolutely set his teeth. But now his whole body had become numb to every physical sensation. Covered with mud and grime, his hair matted against his damp forehead, the lines of pain and exhaustion strongly marked round his quivering mouth, he seemed only to live through his two senses: his sight and his hearing.

The spirit was there though, indomitable, strong, the dogged obstinacy of the man who has nothing more to lose. And with it all the memory of the oath he had sworn to her.

All else was a blank.

Hunted by men, and with a hound on his track, he had-physically-become like the beasts of the Moor, alert to every sound, keen only on eluding his pursuers, on putting off momentarily the inevitable instant of capture and of death.

Early in the day he had been forced to part from his faithful companion.

Jack o' Lantern was exhausted and might have proved an additional source of danger. The gallant beast, accustomed to every bush and every corner of the Heath, knew its way well to its habitual home: the forge of John Stich. Jack Bathurst watched it out of sight, content that it would look after itself, and that being riderless it would be allowed to wend its way unmolested whither it pleased, on the Moor.

And thus he had seen the long hours of this glorious September afternoon drag on their weary course; he had seen the beautiful day turn to late, glowing afternoon, then the sun gradually set in its mantle of purple and gold, and finally the grey dusk throw its elusive and mysterious veil over Tors and Moor. And he, like the hunted beast, crept from gorse bush to scrub, hiding for his life, driven out of one stronghold into another, gasping with thirst, panting with fatigue, determined in spirit, but broken down in body at last.

By instinct and temperament Jack Bathurst was essentially a brave man.

Physical fear was entirely alien to his nature: he had never known it, never felt it. During the earlier part of the afternoon, with a score of men at his heels, some soldiers, others but indifferently-equipped louts, he had really enjoyed the game of hide-and-seek on the Heath: to him, at first, it had been nothing more. It was but a part of that wild, mad life he had chosen, the easily-endured punishment for the breaking of conventional laws.

He knew every shrub and crag on this wild corner of the earth which had become his home, and could have defied a small army, when hidden in the natural strongholds known only to himself.

But when he first heard the yelping of the bloodhound set upon his track by the fiendish cunning of an avowed enemy, an icy horror seemed to creep into his very marrow: a horror born of the feeling of powerlessness, of the inevitableness of it all. His one thought now was lest his hand, trembling and numb with fatigue, would refuse him service when he would wish to turn the muzzle of his pistol against his own temple, in time to evade actual capture.

The dog would not miss him. It was practically useless to hide: flight alone, constant, ceaseless flight, might help him for a while, but it was bound to end one way, and one way only: the scent of blood would lead the cur on his track, and his pursuers would find and seize him!

bind him like a felon, and hang him! Aye! hang him like a common thief!

He had oft laughed and joked with John Stich about his ultimate probable fate. He knew that his wild, unlawful career would come to an end sooner or later, but he always carried pistols in his belt, and had not even remotely dreamt of capture.

... Until now!

But now he was tired, ill, half-paralysed with pain and exhaustion. His trembling hand crept longingly round the heavy silver handle of the precious weapon. Every natural instinct in him clamoured for death, now, at this very moment before that yelping cur drew nearer, before those shouts of triumph were raised over his downfall.

Only ... after that ... what would happen? He would be asleep and at peace ... but she? ... what would she think? ... that like a coward he had deserted his post ... like a felon he had broken his oath, whilst there was one single chance of fulfilling it ... that he had left her at the mercy of that same enemy who had already devised so much cruel treachery.

And like a beast he crept back within his lair, and watched and listened for that one chance of serving her before the end.

He had seen Sir Humphrey Challoner and Mittachip ambling up the hillside. He tried not to lose sight of them, and, if possible, to keep within earshot, but he was driven back by a posse of his pursuers, close upon his heels, and now having succeeded in reaching the road at last, he had the terrible chagrin of seeing that he was too late; the two men were remounting their horses and turning back towards Bra.s.sington.

”Methinks we have outwitted that gallant highwayman after all,” Sir Humphrey was saying with one of those boisterous outbursts of merriment, which to Bathurst's sensitive ears had a ring of the devil's own glee in it.

”What h.e.l.lish mischief have those two reprobates been brewing, I wonder?” he mused. ”If those fellows at my heels hadn't cut me off I might have known...”

He crept nearer to the two men, but they set their horses at a sharp trot down the road: Jack vainly strained his ears to hear their talk.

For the last eight hours he had practically covered every corner of the Heath, backwards and forwards, across boulders and through mora.s.s; the hound had had some difficulty in finding and keeping the trail, but now it seemed suddenly to have found it, the yelping drew nearer, but the shouts had altogether ceased.

What was to be done? G.o.d in heaven, what was to be done?

It was at this moment that the plaintive bleating of one or two of the penned-up sheep suddenly aroused every instinct of vitality in him.