LTTERATURE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6308, 4 August 1888, Page 1

LTTERATURE.

THE OUTLAWS OF TUNSTALL FOREST. [Bt Robebt Lotris Stbvenson.] Author of "Treasure Island," "Kidnapped," "Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde," &c BOOK IV.— THE DISGUISE. Chapter I. THB DEN. The place where Dick had struck the line of a highroad was not far from Holywood, and within nine Or ten miles of Shoreby -on -the -Till j and here, after making sure that they were pursued no longer, the two bodies separated. Lord Foxham's followers departed, carrying their wounded master towards the comfort and seourity of the great abbey ; and Diok,. as he saw them wind away and disappear in the thick curtain of the falling snow, was left alone with near upon a dozen outlaws, the last remainder of his troop of volunteers. Some were wounded ; one and all were furious at their ill-BUCcesa and long exposure; and though they were now too cold and hungry to do more, they grumbled and cast sullen looks upon their leaders. Dick emptied hia purse .among them, leaving himself nothing; thanked them for the courage they had displayed, though he could have found it more readily in his heart to rate them for poltroonery; and having thus somewhat softened the effect of bis prolonged misfortune, despatched them to find their way, either severally or in pairs, to Shoreby and the Goat and Bagpipes. For his own part, influenced by what he had Been on board of the Good Hope, he choae Lawless to be his companion on the walk. The snow was now falling, without pause or variation, in one even, blinding oloud ; the wind had been strangled, and now blew no longer ; and the whole world was blotted out and sheeted down below that silent inundation. There was great danger of wandering by the way and perishing in drifts j and Lawless, keeping half a step in front of his companion, and holding his head forward like a hunting dog upon the scent, inquired his way oi every tree, and studied out their path as though he were conning a ship among dangers. About a mile into the forest they came to a place where several wayß met, under a grove of lofty and contorted oaks. Even in the narrow horizon of the falling snow, it was a spot that conld not fail to be reoognised j and Lawless evidently recognised it with partioular delight. " Now, Master Eichard," said he, " an y* are not too proud to be the gueat of a man who ia neither a gentleman by birth nor so muoh as a good Christian, I can offer you * cap of wine and a good fire to melt the marrow in your frozen bones." " Lead on, Wffl," answered Dick. " A oup of wine and a good fire ! Nay, I would go a far way round to Bee them." Lawless turned aside under the bare branches of the grove, and, walking resolutely forward for some time, came to a steepish hollovror den, that had now drifted a quarter full of snow. On the verge, a great beech-tree hung, precariously rooted j and here the old outlaw, pulling aside some bushy underwood, bodily disappeared into the earth. The beeoh had, in some violent gale, been half-uprooted, and had torn up a considerable stretch of turf; and it was under thia that old Lawless had dug oat his forest hiding-place. The roots served him for rafters, the turf was his thatch; for walls and floor he had hia mother the earth.. Eudeas it was, the hearth in one corner, blackened by fire, andthe presence in another of a large oaken chest well fortified with iron, Bhowed it at one glance to be the den of a man, and not the burrow of a digging beast. Though the snow had drifted at the mouth and sifted in upon the floor of this earth cavern, yet was the air much wanner than withont; and! when Lawless had struck a spark, and the dry furze bushes had begun to blaze and crackle onthe hearth, the place assumed, even to the eye, an air of comfort and of home. With a righ of great contentment, Lawleßß Bpread his broad hands before the fire, and seemed to breathe the smoke. " Here, then," he said, "iB this old Lawless' rabbit-hole ; pray Heaven there come no terrier ! Far I have rolled hither and thither, and here and' about, since that I waa fourteen yeara of mine age and first ran away from mine abbey, with the sacrist's gold chain and mass-book that I sold for four marks. I have been in England and France and Burgundy, and in Spain, too> on a pilgrimage for my poor boul ; and upon the sea, which is no man's country. But here is my place, Maater Shelton. This iB my native land, this burrow in the earth ! Come rain or wind — and whether ife April, and the birdß all sing, and the blossoms fall about my bed— or whether it's winter, and I sit alone with my good gossip the fire, and robin redbreast twitters in the woods — here, anyway, is my church and market, and my wife and child, lfs here I comeback to, and ifs here, so please the saints, that I would like to die." " Tis' a warm comer, to be sure," replied Dicfr, " and a pleasant, and s well hid.'* " It had need to be," returned Lawless, "for an they found it, Master Shelton, it would break ray heart). But here," he added, burrowing with his Btout fingers in the sandy floor, " here is my wine cellar ; and ye ahall have a fiasi of excellent strong stingo." Sure enough, after but a little digging, he produced a big leathern bottle of about a gallon, nearly three-parts full of a very heady and sweet wine ; and when they had drunk to each- other comradely, and the fire had been replenished and blazed up again, the pair lay at full length, thawing and steaming, and divinely warm. " Master Shelton," observed the outlaw, "y' 'avo had two mischances this last while, atid yard like to lose the maiddo I take it aright?" " Aright ! " returned Dick, nodding hia head. " WeU, now, continued Lawless, " hear an old fool that hath been nigh-hand everything, and seen nigh-hand all! Ye go too much on other people's errands, Master Dick. Te go on Ellis' ; but he deaireth rather the death of Sir Daniel. Ye goon Lord Foxhant's; well— the saints preserve him! — doubtless he meaneth well. But go ye npon you* own, ' good Dick. Come right to the maid's side. Court her, lest that she forget you. Be ready; and when the chance shall come, off with her at the saddle-bow." "Ayj but, Lawless^ beyond doubt Bhe is now in Sir Daniel's own mansion," answered Dick. "Thither, then, go we," replied the outlaw. Dick stared at him. "Nay, I mean it," iiodded Lawless. "And if y' are df so little faith, and afcnuible at a word, see here ! " And the outlaw, taking a key from about his neok, opened the oak chest, and dipping aud groping deep among its contents, produced first a friar's robe, and next a girdle of rope; and then a huge roßary of wood, heavy enough to be counted as a weapon. " Here," he said, " is for you. On with them ! " And then, when Dick had clothed himself in >thia clerical disguise, Lawless produced some odours and a penoil, and proceeded, with the greatest ensuing, to disguise his face, The eyebrows he fmok* ened anfiv^pi*o'ifleßifc>^4iW

which was yet hardly visible-, he tendered a like serTice ; while, by a few lines around the eye, he changed the expression and increased the apparent age of this young monk. i "*' Now," he resumed, " when I have done the like, we shall make aa bonny a pair of friars as the eye could wish. Boldly to Sir Daniel's we shall go, and there he hospitably welcome for the lovo of Mother Chnroh." " And how, dear Lawleßß," cried the lad, shall I repay you ? " "Tut brother," replied the outlaw," l do naught but for my pleasure. Mind not for me. lam one, by the masß, that mindeth for himself. When that I Lack, I have a lon? tongue and a voice like the monastery bell — I do ask, my son; aod when asking faileth, I do most usually take." And the old rogue made- a grimace so humorous, that, although Dick waa displeased to lie under so great favours to so equivocal a personage, he was yet unable to restrain his mirth. With that Lawless returned to the big chest and was soon similarly dißguised; hut below hia gown Dick wondered to observe him conceal a aheaf of black arrows. "Wherefore do ye that?" asked the lad. " Wherefore arrows, when ye takd no how?" "Nay," replied Lawless, lightly, "'tis like there will be heads broke— not to say backs— ere you and I win sound from where we're going to ; and if any fall, I would our fellowship would come by the credit on't. A black arrow, Master Dick, is the seal of our abbey; it showeth- you who writ the bill." "An ye prepare so carefully," said Dick " I have here aome papers that for mine own sake, and the interest of those that trusted me, were better left behind than found upon my body. Where shall I conceal them, Will ? " " Nay," replied Lawless, ' I will go forth into the wood and whistle me three verses of a. song ; meanwhile do ye bury them where ye please, and smooth the sand upon the place. " Never ! " cried Richard. " I trust you man. I were base indeed if I not trusted you." " Brother ye are but a child," replied the old outlaw, pausing and turning his face upon Dick from the threshold of the den. "lama kind old Christian, and no traitor to men's blood, and no sparer of mine own in a friend'a jeopardy. Bufc, fool, child, I am a thief by trade and birth and habit. If my bottle were empty and my mouth dry, I would rob you, dear child, as sure as I love, honour, and admire your parts and person ! Can it be clearer spoken ? , No." And he stumped forth through the bushes with a snap of his big fingers. Dick, thuß left alone, after a wondering thought upon the inconsistencies of bis companion's character, hastily produced, reviewed, and buried his papers. One only he reserved to carry along with him, since it in nowise compromised his friends, and yet might Berve him, in a pinch, against Sir Daniel. That was the knight's own letter to Lord Wensleydala, sent by Throgmorton, on the morrow of the defeat at Kisingham, and found next day by Dick upon the body of the messenger. Then, treading down the embers of the fire, Dick left the den, and rejoined the old outlaw, who stood awaiting him under the leafless oaks, and was already beginning to be powdered by the falling snow. jßach looked upon the other, and each laugrred, so thorough and so droll was the disguise. " Tet I would it were but summer and a clear day," grumbled the outlaw, " that I might see myself in the mirror of a pool. There be many of Sir Daniel's men that j know me ; and if we fell to be recognised, there might be two words for you, brother, bnt as for me, in a paternoster while, I should be kicking in a rope's-end." Thus they set forth together along, the road to Shoreby, which, in this part of its course, kept near along the margin of the forest, coming 1 forth, from time to time, in the open conntry, and passing beside poor folks' houses and small farms. Presently, at the sight of one of these, Lawless pulled up. "Brother Martin," he said, in a voice capitally disguised, and suited to his monkish robe, " let ns enter and seek alms from these poor sinners. Pax vobi&cwm! Ay," he added in his own voice, " 'tis as I feared ; I have somewhat lost the whine of it j and by your leave, good Master Shelton, ye must suffer me to practise in these country places, before that I risk my fat neck bye&teTing Sir Daniel's. But look ye a little, what an excellent thing it is to be a Jack-of-all-trades! An I had not been a shipman, ye had infallibly gone down in the Qood Hope 5 an I had not been a thief, I could not have painted me your face ; and but that I had been a Grey Friar, and sung loud in the choir, and ate hearty at the board, I could not have carried thiß disguise, but the very dogs would have spied US' out and barked at us for shams." He was by this time close to the window of the farm, and he rose on his tip-toes and peeped in. "Nay," he cried, "better and better. We shalt here try our false faces with a vengeance, and have a merry jest on Brother Capper to boot." And so saying,he opened the door and led the way into the house. Three of their own company sat at the table, greedily eating. Their daggers, stuck beside them in the board, and the black- and menacing looks which they continued to shower upon the people of the house, proved that they owed their entertainment rather to force than favour. On the two monks, who now, with a sort of humble dignity, entered the kitchen of the farm, they seemed to turn with a particular resentment ; and one— it was John Capper in person— who seemed to play the leading part, instantly and- rudely ordered them away. "We want no beggard here ! " he cried. But another — although he was as far from recognising Diok and Lawlessinclined to more moderate counsels. "Not so," he cried. "We be strong men, and take ; these be weak and crave ; but in the latter end these shall be uppermost and we below. Mind him not, my father ; bnt come, drink of my cup, and give me a benediction." " V' are men of a light mind, carnal, and accursed," said the monk. "Now, may the saints forbid that ever I should drink with such companions ! But here, for the pity I bear to sinners, here I do leave you a blessed relic, the which, for your soul's interest, I bid you kiss and cherish." So far Lawless thundered upon them like a preaching friar ; but with these words he drew fDom under hia robd a black arrow, tossed it on the board in front of three startled outlaws, turned in the same instant, and, taking Dick along with him, was outof the room and out of sight among the falling snow before they had time to utter a word Or move a finger. "So," he said, " we have proved our false faces, Master Shelton. I will now adventure my poor carcase where ye please." "Good!" returned Richard. ""It irks me to be doing. Set we on. fot Shoreby ! " I (Ta be continued.)