Wager of Battle: A Tale of Saxon Slavery in Sherwood Forest

by Henry William Herbert

  CHAPTER XVI.

  THE ESCAPE.

  Then said King Florentyne, "What noise is this? 'Fore Saint Martyn, Some man," he said, "in my franchise, Hath slain my deer and bloweth the prize."

  GUY OF WARWICK.

  One of those serfs, Eadwulf, was little disposed to resign himselftranquilly to his fate; as within a short period after the occupationof Waltheofstow by the new seneschal, his wonted contumacy had broughthim into wonted disgrace and condemnation, and, there being no longerany clemency overruling the law for the mitigation of such penaltiesas should seem needful, the culprit was on several occasions cruellyscourged, and imprisoned in the lowest vaults of the castle dungeon.

  Maddened by this treatment, he at length resolved to escape at allrisks, and knowing every path and dingle of the forest, he flatteredhimself that he should easily elude pursuers who were strange, as yet,to that portion of the country; and having, on the departure of hisbrother, contrived stealthily to possess himself of the crossbow andbolts which had belonged to him, being intrusted to his care as anunusual boon, owing to his good conduct and his occupation as a sortof underkeeper in the chase, fancied that he should be able easily tosupport himself by killing game in the forests through which he mustmake his way, until he should arrive at the new residence of thatbrother, where he doubted not of finding comfort and assistance.

  During the days which had elapsed between the emancipation of Kenricand his departure from the castle, much had been ascertained, both bythe new freeman and his beautiful betrothed, concerning the routewhich led to their future abode, its actual position, and the wild andsavage nature of the country on which it abutted.

  All this had naturally enough become known to Eadwulf; and he, havingonce been carried as far as to Lancaster by the late lord's equerry,to help in bringing home some recently-purchased war-horses, knew wellthe general direction of the route, and, having heard, while there, ofthe fordable nature of the Lancastrian sands, made little doubt ofbeing able to find his way to his brother, and by his aid to gain thewild hills, where he trusted to subsist himself as a hunter and outlawon the vast and untraversed heaths to the northward.

  It was his hope to gain sufficient start, in the first instance, toenable him to make off so long before his absence should bediscovered, that bloodhounds could not be laid on his track until thescent should be already cold; and then keeping the forest-ground, andavoiding all cleared or cultivated lands, to cross the Lancastersands, and thence, by following up the course of the Kent River, onwhich he knew Kenric would be stationed as verdurer, to gain theinterior labyrinth of fells, moors, morasses, and ravines, which atthat time occupied the greater part of Westmoreland and Cumberland.

  To this end, he managed to conceal himself at nightfall not far fromthe quarter, before the serfs had collected in their dormitory,intending to prosecute his flight so soon as the neighborhood shouldbe steeped in the silence of night, and the moon should give himsufficient light to find his way through the deep forest mazes; andthus, before daybreak, was already some twenty miles distant fromWaltheofstow, where he concealed himself in a deep hazel brake,intending to sleep away the hours of daylight, and resume his flightonce more during the partial darkness of the night.

  It was true that his route lay through the woodland-chase, whichspread far and wide over the environs of Fenton in the Forest, and wasthe property of his new master; but for this he cared little, sincethere had been so small intercourse between the tenantry and vassalsof his late lord and those of Sir Foulke d'Oilly, that he had no fearsof being recognized by any chance retainer whom he might possiblyencounter, while he knew that, should he chance to be discovered by apassing serf of his own oppressed race, he should not be betrayed bythem to their mutual tyrants. Armed, therefore, at large, and alreadyat a considerable distance from the scene of his captivity, heconsidered himself well-nigh safe when he concealed himself, in theearly gray of the dawn, in such a dingle as he felt sure would securehim from the chance intrusion of any casual wayfarers.

  Under one difficulty, however, he sorely labored. He had been unableto carry with him any provision, however slender; and he must dependon his skill as a forester for his sustenance, by poaching in thewoods which he had to traverse, and cooking his game as best he might,borrowing an hour or two of the darkness for the purpose, and kindlinghis fire in the most remote and obscure places, to avoid danger of thesmoke being observed by day, or the glare of the fire by night.

  He had lost his evening meal on the previous day, and the appetite ofthe Saxon peasant was proverbially mighty; while, as is ever the casewith men who have no motives to self-restraint or economy, abstinencewas an unknown power.

  It was vastly to his joy, therefore, that when the sun was gettingfairly above the horizon, after he had been himself lurking an hour ortwo in the thick covert, he saw among the branches a noble stag comepicking his way daintily along a deer-path which skirted the dingle,accompanied by two slim and graceful does, evidently intending to layup, during the day, in the very brake which he unwittingly hadoccupied.

  He had no sooner espied the animal, which was coming down wind uponhim, utterly unconscious of the proximity of his direst foe, then hecrouched low among the fern, fitted a quarrel to the string of hisarbalast, and waited until his game was within ten paces of hisambush.

  Then the winch was released, the bow twanged, and the forked head ofthe ponderous bolt crashed through the brain of the noble stag. Onegreat bound he made, covering six yards of forest soil in that lastleap of the death agony, and then laid dead almost at the feet of hisunseen destroyer. The terrified does fled in wild haste into theopener parts of the forest, and, in an instant, the keen wood-knife ofthe Saxon had pierced the throat of the deer, and selected suchportions, carved from the still quivering carcass, as he could mosteasily carry with him. These thrust carefully into the sort ofhunting-pouch, or wallet, which he wore slung under his left arm, heproceeded, with the utmost wariness and caution, to cover up theslaughtered beast with boughs of the trees and brackens, rejoicing inhis secret soul that he had secured to himself provision for two dayslonger at the least, and hoping that on the fourth morning he would bein security, beyond the broad expanse of Morecambe Bay.

  But wonderfully deceitful are the hopes of the human heart; and, inthe present instance, as often is the case, the very facts which heregarded as most auspicious were pregnant with the deepest danger.

  Even where he had most warily calculated his chances, and chosen hismeasures with the deepest precaution, selecting the full of the moonfor the period of his escape, and choosing the route in which he hadanticipated the least danger of interruption, he had erred the mostsignally.

  For it had so fallen out that Sir Foulke d'Oilly, having appointedthis very day for a grand hunting match in his woods of Fenton, hadissued orders to a strong party of his vassals, under the leading ofBlack Hugonet, his seneschal, and his brother, Ralph Wetheral, thebailiff, to come up from Waltheofstow by daybreak, and rendezvous at astation in the forest not a league distant from the spot in whichEadwulf had so unhappily chosen to conceal himself.

  At the very moment in which the serf had launched his fatal boltagainst the deer, the bailiff, Ralph Wetheral, who was, by virtue ofhis office, better acquainted with his person than any others of thehousehold, was within a half a mile of his lair, engaged in trackingup the slot of the very animal which he was rejoicing to have slain,by aid of a mute lymer, or slow-hound, of an especial breed, kept andtrained for the purpose; and in furtherance of his pursuit, haddismounted from his horse, and was following the dog as he dragged himonward, tugging at the leash; while ten or fifteen of his companionswere scattered through the woods behind him, beating them carefully,in order to track the stags or wild boars to their lairs, before thearrival of their lord.

  It was, perhaps, half an hour after he had discharged the shot, whenhe was alarmed by a light rustling of the under-wood and the crackingof dry sticks under a cautious footstep, and at first surmised
that asecond beast of chase was following on the track of his predecessor.But, in a moment, he was undeceived, by hearing the voice of a manwhispering a few low words of encouragement to a dog, and at once thefull extent of his danger flashed upon him. The dog was evidentlyquesting the animal he had shot, and, within an instant, would leadhis master to the spot. Under the cruel enactment of the Normanforest-laws, to slay a deer was a higher offense than to kill afellow-man; the latter crime being in many cases remissible on thepayment of a fine, while the former inevitably brought down on theculprit capital punishment, often enhanced by torture. To be foundhidden, close behind a warm and yet bleeding stag, was tantamount tobeing taken red-handed in the fact, and instant death was the leastpunishment to be looked for.

  Discovery was so close at hand, that flight itself seemed impossible;yet in immediate flight lay the sole chance of safety. He had alreadystarted from his lair, when the slow-hound, coming on the track of thefresh blood, set up a wild and savage yell, broke from the leash, andin a second was standing over the slaughtered quarry, tearing awaywith his fangs and claws the bushes which covered the carcass.

  At the same moment, the branches were parted, and the bailiff ofWaltheofstow stood before the culprit, carrying an unbended long-bowin his hand, and having a score of cloth-yard arrows at his belt, ashort anlace at his side, and his bugle slung about his neck.

  The recognition on each side was immediate, and the Norman advancedfearlessly to seize the fugitive, raising his bugle to his lips, as hecame on, to summon succor. But Eadwulf, who had already laid a quarrelin the groove of the crossbow, with some indefinite idea of shootingthe dog before the man should enter upon the scene, raised the weaponquickly to his shoulder, and, taking rapid aim, discharged it full atthe breast of the bold intruder.

  The heavy missile took effect, just as it was aimed, piercing thecavity of the man's heart, that he sprang a foot or better up into theair, and fell slain outright upon the body of the deer, which his doghad discovered, his spirit passing away without a struggle or aconvulsion.

  The dog uttered a long, melancholy, wailing howl, stooped to snuff atand lick the face of its murdered master, and then, as Eadwulf wasdrawing forth a third quarrel, before he could bend the arbalastagain, or fit the missile to the string, fled howling into the woodwhence he had come, as if he foresaw his purpose.

  "A curse upon the yelling cur; he will bring the hue-and-cry down onme in no time. There is nothing but a run for it, and but a poorchance at that."

  And, with the words, he dashed away toward the northwest, through theopener parts of the forest, at a speed which, could he have maintainedit, would have soon carried him out of the reach of pursuit. Andwonderfully he did maintain it; for at the end of the second hour hehad run nearly fifteen miles from the scene of the murder; and here,on the brink of a small brimful river, of perhaps forty or fifty yardsin width, flowing tranquilly but rapidly through the greenwoods, in acourse not very much from the direction which he desired to follow, hecast himself down on the turf, and lay panting heavily for someminutes on the sward, until he had in some degree recovered hisbreath, when he bathed his face in the cool water, drank a fewswallows, and then crossing the stream by some large stepping-stoneswhich lay here in a shallow spot, continued his flight with singularspeed and endurance.

  He had not, however, fled above a hundred or two of yards beyond thewater, when he heard, at the distance of about three miles behind him,the sound he most dreaded to hear, the deep bay of bloodhounds. Beyonddoubt, they were on his track; and how was he to shun theirindomitable fury?

  He was a man of some resource and skill in woodcraft, although rudeand barbarous in other matters; and, in desperate emergencies, menthink rapidly, and act on the first thought.

  The second tone of the dogs had scarcely reached his ear, before hewas rushing backward, as nearly as possible in his own tracks, to theriver, into which, from the first stepping-stone, he leapedhead-foremost, and swam vigorously and lightly down the current, whichbore him bravely on his way. The stream was swift and strong; and itsbanks, clothed with thick underwood, concealed his movements from theeyes of any one on either margin; and he had floated down considerablymore than a mile, before he heard the bloodhounds come up in full cryto the spot where he had passed the water, and cross over it, cheeredby the shouts and bugle-blasts of the man-hunters.

  Then their deep clamor ceased at once, where he had turned on his backtrack, and he knew they were at fault, and perceived that the men, bytheir vociferations and bugle-notes, were casting them to and fro inall directions, to recover his scent.

  Still he swam rapidly onward, and had interposed nearly another milebetween himself and his pursuers, when he heard, by their shoutscoming down either bank, that they had divined the stratagem to whichhe had had recourse, and were trailing him down the margins, secure ofstriking his track again, wherever he should leave the river.

  He was again becoming very anxious, when a singular accident gave himanother chance of safety. A wood-pigeon, flapping its wings violentlyas it took flight, attracted his attention to the tree from which ittook wing. It was a huge oak, overhanging the stream, into which oneof its branches actually dipped, sound and entire below, but with alarge hollow at about twenty feet from the ground, which, as he easilydivined, extended downward to the level of the soil. No sooner seen,than he had seized the pendulous branch, swung himself up by it,through a prodigious exertion, and, springing with mad haste frombough to bough, reached the opening in the decayed trunk. It was agrim, dark abyss, and, should he enter it, he saw not how he shouldever make his exit. But a nearer shout, and the sounds of gallopinghorsemen, decided him. He entered it foot-foremost, hung by his handsfor a moment to the orifice, in hesitation, and then, relaxing hishold, dropped sheer down through the rotten wood, and spiders'-webs,and unhealthy funguses, to the bottom of the tunnel-shaped hollow.Aroused from their diurnal dreams by the crash of his descent, twogreat brown-owls rushed out of the summit of the tree, and swoopeddown over the heads of the men-at-arms, who just at the instant passedunder the branches, jingling in their panoply, and effectuallyprevented any suspicion from attaching to the hiding-place.

  For the moment he was safe; and there he stood, in almost totaldarkness, shivering with wet and cold, amid noisome smells and dampexhalations, listening to the shouts of his enemies, as they rode toand fro, until they were lost in the distance.