Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor
despair; for after leaping a little brook which crosses the track at
Newland, he stuck fast in a “dancing bog,” as we call them upon Exmoor.
The horse had broken through the crust of moss and sedge and marishweed,
and could do nothing but wallow and sink, with the black water spirting
over him. And Jeremy, struggling with all his might, saw the three
villains now topping the crest, less than a furlong behind him; and
heard them shout in their savage delight. With the calmness of despair,
he yet resolved to have one more try for it; and scrambling over the
horse's head, gained firm land, and tugged at the bridle. The poor nag
replied with all his power to the call upon his courage, and reared his
forefeet out of the slough, and with straining eyeballs gazed at him.
“Now,” said Jeremy, “now, my fine fellow!” lifting him with the bridle,
and the brave beast gathered the roll of his loins, and sprang from his
quagmired haunches. One more spring, and he was on earth again, instead
of being under it; and Jeremy leaped on his back, and stooped, for he
knew that they would fire. Two bullets whistled over him, as the horse,
mad with fright, dashed forward; and in five minutes more he had come to
the Exe, and the pursuers had fallen behind him. The Exe, though a much
smaller stream than the Barle, now ran in a foaming torrent, unbridged,
and too wide for leaping. But Jeremy's horse took the water well; and
both he and his rider were lightened, as well as comforted by it. And as
they passed towards Lucott hill, and struck upon the founts of Lynn,
the horses of the three pursuers began to tire under them. Then Jeremy
Stickles knew that if he could only escape the sloughs, he was safe for
the present; and so he stood up in his stirrups, and gave them a loud
halloo, as if they had been so many foxes.
Their only answer was to fire the remaining charge at him; but the
distance was too great for any aim from horseback; and the dropping
bullet idly ploughed the sod upon one side of him. He acknowledged it
with a wave of his hat, and laid one thumb to his nose, in the manner
fashionable in London for expression of contempt. However, they followed
him yet farther; hoping to make him pay out dearly, if he should only
miss the track, or fall upon morasses. But the neighbourhood of our Lynn
stream is not so very boggy; and the King's messenger now knew his
way as well as any of his pursuers did; and so he arrived at Plover's
Barrows, thankful, and in rare appetite.
“But was the poor soldier drowned?” asked Annie; “and you never went to
look for him! Oh, how very dreadful!”
“Shot, or drowned; I know not which. Thank God it was only a trooper.
But they shall pay for it, as dearly as if it had been a captain.”
“And how was it you were struck by a bullet, and only shaken in your
saddle? Had you a coat of mail on, or of Milanese chain-armour? Now,
Master Stickles, had you?”
“No, Mistress Lizzie; we do not wear things of that kind nowadays. You
are apt, I perceive, at romances. But I happened to have a little flat
bottle of the best stoneware slung beneath my saddle-cloak, and filled
with the very best _eau de vie_, from the George Hotel, at Southmolton.
The brand of it now is upon my back. Oh, the murderous scoundrels, what
a brave spirit they have spilled!”
“You had better set to and thank God,” said I, “that they have not
spilled a braver one.”
CHAPTER XLVIII
EVERY MAN MUST DEFEND HIMSELF
It was only right in Jeremy Stickles, and of the simplest common sense,
that he would not tell, before our girls, what the result of his journey
was. But he led me aside in the course of the evening, and told me all
about it; saying that I knew, as well as he did, that it was not woman's
business. This I took, as it was meant, for a gentle caution that Lorna
(whom he had not seen as yet) must not be informed of any of his doings.
Herein I quite agreed with him; not only for his furtherance, but
because I always think that women, of whatever mind, are best when least
they meddle with the things that appertain to men.
Master Stickles complained that the weather had been against him
bitterly, closing all the roads around him; even as it had done with us.
It had taken him eight days, he said, to get from Exeter to Plymouth;
whither he found that most of the troops had been drafted off from
Exeter. When all were told, there was but a battalion of one of the
King's horse regiments, and two companies of foot soldiers; and their
commanders had orders, later than the date of Jeremy's commission, on
no account to quit the southern coast, and march inland. Therefore,
although they would gladly have come for a brush with the celebrated
Doones, it was more than they durst attempt, in the face of their
instructions. However, they spared him a single trooper, as a companion
of the road, and to prove to the justices of the county, and the lord
lieutenant, that he had their approval.
To these authorities Master Stickles now was forced to address himself,
although he would rather have had one trooper than a score from the
very best trained bands. For these trained bands had afforded very good
soldiers, in the time of the civil wars, and for some years afterwards;
but now their discipline was gone; and the younger generation had seen
no real fighting. Each would have his own opinion, and would want to
argue it; and if he were not allowed, he went about his duty in such a
temper as to prove that his own way was the best.
Neither was this the worst of it; for Jeremy made no doubt but what (if
he could only get the militia to turn out in force) he might manage,
with the help of his own men, to force the stronghold of the enemy; but
the truth was that the officers, knowing how hard it would be to collect
their men at that time of the year, and in that state of the weather,
began with one accord to make every possible excuse. And especially
they pressed this point, that Bagworthy was not in their county; the
Devonshire people affirming vehemently that it lay in the shire of
Somerset, and the Somersetshire folk averring, even with imprecations,
that it lay in Devonshire. Now I believe the truth to be that the
boundary of the two counties, as well as of Oare and Brendon parishes,
is defined by the Bagworthy river; so that the disputants on both sides
were both right and wrong.
Upon this, Master Stickles suggested, and as I thought very sensibly,
that the two counties should unite, and equally contribute to the
extirpation of this pest, which shamed and injured them both alike. But
hence arose another difficulty; for the men of Devon said they would
march when Somerset had taken the field; and the sons of Somerset
replied that indeed they were quite ready, but what were their cousins
of Devonshire doing? And so it came to pass that the King's Commissioner
returned without any army whatever; but with promise of two hundred men
when the roads should be more passable. And meanwhile, what were we to
do, abandoned as we were to the mercies of the Doones, with only our own
hands to help us? And herein I grieved at my own folly, in having let
Tom Faggus go, whose wit and courage would have been worth at least half
a dozen men to us. Upon this matter I held long council with my good
friend Stickles; telling him all about Lorna's presence, and what I knew
of her history. He agreed with me that we could not hope to escape an
attack from the outlaws, and the more especially now that they knew
himself to be returned to us. Also he praised me for my forethought
in having threshed out all our corn, and hidden the produce in such a
manner that they were not likely to find it. Furthermore, he recommended
that all the entrances to the house should at once be strengthened,
and a watch must be maintained at night; and he thought it wiser that
I should go (late as it was) to Lynmouth, if a horse could pass the
valley, and fetch every one of his mounted troopers, who might now be
quartered there. Also if any men of courage, though capable only of
handling a pitchfork, could be found in the neighbourhood, I was to try
to summon them. But our district is so thinly peopled, that I had little
faith in this; however my errand was given me, and I set forth upon it;
for John Fry was afraid of the waters.
Knowing how fiercely the floods were out, I resolved to travel the
higher road, by Cosgate and through Countisbury; therefore I swam my
horse through the Lynn, at the ford below our house (where sometimes you
may step across), and thence galloped up and along the hills. I could
see all the inland valleys ribbon'd with broad waters; and in every
winding crook, the banks of snow that fed them; while on my right the
turbid sea was flaked with April showers. But when I descended the hill
towards Lynmouth, I feared that my journey was all in vain.
For the East Lynn (which is our river) was ramping and roaring
frightfully, lashing whole trunks of trees on the rocks, and rending
them, and grinding them. And into it rushed, from the opposite side, a
torrent even madder; upsetting what it came to aid; shattering wave with
boiling billow, and scattering wrath with fury. It was certain death to
attempt the passage: and the little wooden footbridge had been carried
away long ago. And the men I was seeking must be, of course, on the
other side of this deluge, for on my side there was not a single house.
I followed the bank of the flood to the beach, some two or three hundred
yards below; and there had the luck to see Will Watcombe on the opposite
side, caulking an old boat. Though I could not make him hear a word,
from the deafening roar of the torrent, I got him to understand at last
that I wanted to cross over. Upon this he fetched another man, and the
two of them launched a boat; and paddling well out to sea, fetched round
the mouth of the frantic river. The other man proved to be Stickles's
chief mate; and so he went back and fetched his comrades, bringing their
weapons, but leaving their horses behind. As it happened there were
but four of them; however, to have even these was a help; and I started
again at full speed for my home; for the men must follow afoot, and
cross our river high up on the moorland.
This took them a long way round, and the track was rather bad to find,
and the sky already darkening; so that I arrived at Plover's Barrows
more than two hours before them. But they had done a sagacious thing,
which was well worth the delay; for by hoisting their flag upon the
hill, they fetched the two watchmen from the Foreland, and added them to
their number.
It was lucky that I came home so soon; for I found the house in a great
commotion, and all the women trembling. When I asked what the matter
was, Lorna, who seemed the most self-possessed, answered that it was all
her fault, for she alone had frightened them. And this in the following
manner. She had stolen out to the garden towards dusk, to watch some
favourite hyacinths just pushing up, like a baby's teeth, and just
attracting the fatal notice of a great house-snail at night-time. Lorna
at last had discovered the glutton, and was bearing him off in triumph
to the tribunal of the ducks, when she descried two glittering eyes
glaring at her steadfastly, from the elder-bush beyond the stream.
The elder was smoothing its wrinkled leaves, being at least two months
behind time; and among them this calm cruel face appeared; and she knew
it was the face of Carver Doone.
The maiden, although so used to terror (as she told me once before),
lost all presence of mind hereat, and could neither shriek nor fly, but