Come Rack! Come Rope!. Robert Hugh Benson

woods, they came upon a herd of deer, who stared on them without any movement that the eye could see. Here a stag stood with two hinds beside him; behind, Robin saw the backs and heads of others that lay still. Only the beasts kept their eyes upon them, as they went, watching, as if it were a picture only that went by. So, by little and little, the breeze stirred like a waking man; cocks crew from over the hills one to the other; dogs barked far away, till the face of the world was itself again, and the smoke from Matstead rose above the trees in front.

      Robin had ridden in the dawn an hundred times before; yet never before had he so perceived that strange deliberateness and sleep of the world; and he had ridden, too, perhaps twenty times at such an hour, with his father beside him, after mass on some such occasion. Yet it seemed to him this time that it was the mass which he had seen, and his own solitariness, that had illuminated his eyes. It was dreadful to him—and yet it threw him more than ever on himself and God—that his father would ride with him so no more. Henceforward he would go alone, or with a servant only; he would, alone, go up to the door of house or barn and rap four times with his riding-whip; alone he would pass upstairs through the darkened house to the shrouded room, garret or bed-chamber, where the group was assembled, all in silence; where presently a dark figure would rise and light the pair of candles, and then, himself a ghost, vest there by their light, throwing huge shadows on wainscot and ceiling as his arms went this way and that; and then, alone of all that were of blood-relationship to him, he would witness the Holy Sacrifice. …

      How long that would be so, he did not know. Something surely must happen that would prevent it. Or, at least, some day, he would ride so with Marjorie, whom he had seen this morning across the dusky candle-lit gloom, praying in a corner; or, maybe, with her would entertain the priest, and open the door to the worshippers who streamed in, like bees to a flower-garden, from farm and manor and village. He could not for ever ride alone from Matstead and meet his father's silence.

      One thing more, too, had moved him this morning; and that, the sight of the young priest at the altar whom he had met on the moor. Here, more than ever, was the gentle priestliness and innocency apparent. He stood there in his red vestments; he moved this way and that; he made his gestures; he spoke in undertones, lit only by the pair of wax-candles, more Levitical than ever in such a guise, yet more unsuited than ever to such exterior circumstances. Surely this man should say mass for ever; yet surely never again ride over the moors to do it, amidst enemies. He was of the strong castle and the chamber, not of the tent and the battle. … And yet it was of such soldiers as these, as well as of the sturdy and the strong, that Christ's army was made.

      * * * * *

      It was in broad daylight, though under a weeping sky, that Robin rode into the court at Matstead. He shook the rain from his cloak within the screens, and stamped to get the mud away; and, as he lifted his hat to shake it, his father came in from the pleasaunce.

      Robin glanced up at him, swift and shy, half smiling, expecting a word or a look. His father must surely have read his little letter by now, and forgiven him. But the smile died away again, as he met the old man's eyes; they were as hard as steel; his clean-shaven lips were set like a trap, and, though he looked at his son, it seemed that he did not see him. He passed through the screens and went down the steps into the court.

      The boy's heart began to beat so as near to sicken him after his long fast and his ride. He told himself that his father could not have been into the parlour yet, though he knew, even while he thought it, that this was false comfort. He stood there an instant, waiting; hoping that even now his father would call to him; but the strong figure passed resolutely on out of sight.

      Then the boy went into the hall, and swiftly through it. There on the desk in the window lay the pen he had flung down last night, but no more; the letter was gone; and, as he turned away, he saw lying among the wood-ashes of the cold stove a little crumpled ball. He stooped and drew it out. It was his letter, tossed there after the reading; his father had not taken the pains to keep it safe, nor even to destroy it.

CHAPTER IV

       Table of Contents

      I

      The company was already assembled both within and without Padley, when Robin rode up from the riverside, on a fine, windy morning, for the sport of the day. Perhaps a dozen horses stood tethered at the entrance to the little court, with a man or two to look after them, for the greater part of their riders were already within; and a continual coming and going of lads with dogs; falconers each with his cadge, or three-sided frame on which sat the hawks; a barking of hounds, a screaming of birds, a clatter of voices and footsteps in the court—all this showed that the boy was none too early. A man stepped forward to take his mare and his hawks; and Robin slipped from his saddle and went in.

      * * * * *

      Padley Hall was just such a house as would serve a wealthy gentleman who desired a small country estate with sufficient dignity and not too many responsibilities. It stood upon the side of the hill, well set-up above the damps of the valley, yet protected from the north-easterly winds by the higher slopes, on the tops of which lay Burbage Moor, where the hawking was to be held. On the south, over the valley, stood out the modest hall and buttery (as, indeed, they stand to this day), with a door between them, well buttressed in two places upon the falling ground, in one by a chimney, in the other by a slope of masonry; and behind these buildings stood the rest of the court, the stables, the wash-house, the bake-house and such like, below; and, above, the sleeping rooms for the family and the servants. On the first floor, above the buttery and the hall, were situated the ladies' parlour and chapel; for this, at least, Padley had, however little its dignity in other matters, that it retained its chapel served in these sorrowful days not, as once, by a chaplain, but by whatever travelling priest might be there.

      * * * * *

      Robin entered through the great gate on the east side—a dark entrance kept by a porter who saluted him—and rode through into the court; and here, indeed, was the company; for out of the windows of the low hall on his left came a babble of tongues, while two or three gentlemen with pots in their hands saluted him from the passage door, telling him that Mr. Thomas FitzHerbert was within. Mr. Fenton was one of these, come over from North Lees, where he had his manor, a brisk, middle-aged man, dressed soberly and well, with a pointed beard and pleasant, dancing eyes.

      "And Mr. John, too, came last night," he said; "but he will not hawk with us. He is ridden from London on private matters."

      It was an exceedingly gay sight on which Robin looked as he turned into the hall. It was a low room, ceiled in oak and wainscoted half-way up, a trifle dark, since it was lighted only by one or two little windows on either side, yet warm and hospitable looking; with a great fire burning in a chimney on the south side, and perhaps a dozen and a half persons sitting over their food and drink, since they were dining early to-day to have the longer time for sport.

      A voice hailed him as he came in; and he went up to pay his respects to Mr. John FitzHerbert, a tall man, well past middle-age, who sat with his hat on his head, at the centre of the high table, with the arms of Eyre and FitzHerbert beneath the canopy, all emblazoned, to do the honours of the day.

      "You are late, sir, you are late!" he cried out genially. "We are just done."

      Robin saluted him. He liked this man, though he did not know him very well; for he was continually about the country, now in London, now at Norbury, now at Swinnerton, always occupied with these endless matters of fines and recusancy.

      Robin saluted him then, and said a word or two; bowed to Mr. Thomas, his son, who came up to speak with him; and then looked for Marjorie. She sat there, at the corner of the table, with Mrs. Fenton at one side, and an empty seat on the other. Robin immediately sat down in it, to eat his dinner, beginning with the "gross foods," according to the English custom. There was a piece of Christmas brawn to-day, from a pig fattened on oats and peas, and hardened by being lodged (while he lived) on a boarded floor; all this was told Robin across the table with particularity, while he ate it,