However, notwithstanding the absence of the viol, his discourse was enough to gain for him a good collection, to strengthen the general belief in witches, and to influence the minds of the villagers against them; for he singled out those who dealt leniently with witches for punishment, either in the near or distant future, which was just what his congregation was glad to hear. Not that the preacher was a bad man, certainly not worse than his neighbours, but he was as ignorant and superst.i.tious as any of them.

Great cackling there was among the women when the discourse was ended.

It was Lady Eleanor who had delivered the witch and the idiot out of their hands; but the villagers could not suspect her of harm who was always so thoughtful and kind, and who had given more than any one towards replacing the preacher's cow. "But her ladyship's that tender-hearted, you see," they said, "and the best of folks is sometimes mistook;" and they shook their heads solemnly, each thinking in her heart that she knew of at least one excellent person who was never mistaken. But who was it that had excused the mazed man to her ladyship? The Corporal. Who had contrived to be out of the way, though in charge of the children, when the mazed man came to them? The Corporal again.

So the whisper went round that the Corporal was in league with the witch; and the preacher, who had not forgotten about the ba.s.s viol, though he said only a few mysterious words, seemed rather to agree.

Then Mrs. Fry revealed the fact that she had suspected the Corporal from the first; for to begin with he was a soldier.

"And what drove he to 'list?" she asked indignantly. "No good, I'll warrant mun. 'Tisn't good that drives men to 'list. There was Jan Dart that 'listed twenty year agone, and 'ticed away Lucy Clatworthy to follow mun, her that was only child of Jeremiah Clatworthy up to Loudacott; and the old Jeremiah got drinking and died after she left mun. And there's Jan's old mother, poor soul, that loved mun as the apple of her eye, waiting here alone, and I reckon her time's short.

No! I knows what it is when men go for sojers."

It was perhaps fortunate that Mrs. Mugford was not at chapel that evening or there might have been angry words; but the rest of the women, having no interest in soldiers, with perfect honesty agreed with Mrs. Fry, and lamented that her ladyship should be so misguided as to employ a man like the Corporal, for it would surely end in no good,--sojers never did. Look at Mrs. Mugford's boy that went for a marine, and came back with the shak.u.ms so bad that you could hear his teeth chattering a mile away when the fit was on him. The conversation would have lingered long on the symptoms of "shak.u.ms," or in other words of ague, had not some one called to mind the bill on the church-door about the deserter. Then the tongues were set wagging afresh. Two guineas were a lot of money, they said, but soldiers was often badly served, and 'twas no wonder they runned away. But it wasn't well to have strange men about the place, least of all sojers, for they never learned no good.

The mention of strange men about the place of course brought back the subject of the idiot, and then the thought occurred to one of the women that he might be the deserter in question. The idea was at once taken up by her companions, and the more they talked, the more likely it seemed to them. The man had been driven from his regiment probably because of his evil doings, and was come to Ashacombe to plague them; and all agreed that it would be very pleasant to earn two guineas by the catching of him. Mrs. Fry went home brimful of this new notion and poured it out to Mrs. Mugford, who listened with unusual interest, and without either contradiction or interruption, which was a most unusual thing. But at last she broke out with much earnestness:

"You'm right, you may depend, Mrs. Fry; you'm right. That mazed man is the man that they'm a-sarching for; and it's my belief that he isn't mazed at all but so well in his head as you and I be,--just pretending like. And you'm right about that Brimacott too, and I do hope that every one will let mun know that he's not welcome in Ashacombe. He's a prying man and a tale-bearing man, that's what I believe he is, and all to deceive her ladyship and keep friends with the witch. But we'll catch that mazed man for all his pretending, and there there will be two guineas for you and me."

Any one else but Mrs. Fry might have thought it strange for the Corporal to be called a tale-bearer by the very woman who had told tales against her; but Mrs. Fry was not a clever woman, and after all she had suffered under Lady Eleanor's tongue through the Corporal's report. Lady Eleanor knew that if the Corporal told her anything that went on in the village, which he very rarely did, it was right that she should know it; but that was not Mrs. Fry's opinion. So the two agreed that the Corporal was an enemy to the village, though, as is usually the way, they never thought of complaining to Lady Eleanor of him.

But had Mrs. Fry stayed at home instead of going to chapel, she would have understood better the meaning of Mrs. Mugford's words. For having packed off her husband, who was a feeble creature, to take the children out for a walk, Mrs. Mugford stationed herself at a window from which she could see any one that came down from the woods at the back of the house; and after a time she saw a shortish man, fair-haired and blue-eyed, walk stealthily down to her. He was a miserable-looking fellow, with a pinched white face, matted hair and new-grown beard, and dressed only in a shirt and a pair of light-blue soldier's trousers.

She smuggled him quickly into the house and locked the door; and when after a quarter of an hour the door opened again, and after due looking round the man was let out, he was dressed like an ordinary labourer.

He carried bread and bacon tied up in a handkerchief in his hand, and disappeared into the wood as quickly as he could; and as soon as he was gone Mrs. Mugford very solemnly put the trousers and shirt, that he had worn when he came in, upon the fire and burned them.

CHAPTER VII

So another fortnight pa.s.sed away, and nothing happened to disturb the usual peace of Ashacombe. Nothing was seen or heard of the idiot or his mother nor of any one who corresponded to the description of the deserter. The Corporal indeed realised that the tone of the village towards him was not so friendly as before, but he set that down to the preacher's influence and took little notice of it; for indeed he cared little so long as he was with Lady Eleanor and the children, and could count Colonel Fitzdenys among his friends.

But up at the Hall there were heavy hearts; for Lady Eleanor had spoken, not for the first time, to Colonel George about sending d.i.c.k to school, and he had answered that it was high time for him to go, as it was a bad thing for boys to stay too long at home with their mothers; and he said that he himself had been sent to school at six, whereas d.i.c.k was already nine. He added that by chance he had heard of a good school while pa.s.sing through London, and would arrange matters for her if she wished it. It was rather strange, by the way, that Colonel George always happened by chance to know everything that could save Lady Eleanor trouble. So with a sigh Lady Eleanor had a.s.sented that d.i.c.k should go; and it had been settled that he should leave in a few weeks. d.i.c.k was rather triumphant, Elsie rather jealous, the Corporal in secret rather sad, and Lady Eleanor very melancholy.

So one day early in September Lady Eleanor promised the children that for an unusual treat they should have a ride with the Corporal rather further than usual on to the moor. She would not ride herself, for her favourite horse was lame, but settled that she would drive them some way up the valley in the afternoon, and there meet the Corporal, who would go on before them leading the ponies, and ride with them on to the moor. Accordingly on the appointed day the Corporal rode through the village on old Billy, leading a pony on each side. Not a soul wished him good-day, and the Corporal felt that all were making unpleasant remarks--indeed he caught the words, "Dear! to think that they sweet children should be trusted to such as he."

But he trotted on without taking any notice, up the valley to the appointed meeting-place.

Lady Eleanor drove up rather late, for the horse-flies had been very troublesome; and the children seeing the grey pony which drew them covered all over with little flecks of blood, had constantly entreated her to stop while they jumped down and knocked the flies off him. At last, however, she came. The children mounted their ponies, d.i.c.k very proud of a new saddle and stirrups to which he had been promoted after leaping the bar bare-backed, and they rode away up a gra.s.s path to the covert, kissing their hands as they went.

And then Lady Eleanor turned round and drove down the valley, feeling very lonely and unhappy over the prospect of losing d.i.c.k. Her thoughts wandered back to her first meeting with Richard Bracefort, the handsome captain of Light Dragoons, her engagement, her wedding in a London drawing-room, and her first visit to Bracefort Hall. Then had come some two years of happy life in country-quarters. Those were pleasant days to look back on, when her husband would come in from parade and say that he believed he had in his troop as good officers and men as were to be found in the service; while George Fitzdenys, the lieutenant, would tell her that there were few such officers as her husband to be found in the Army, and the little cornet, who was little more than a boy, would be lavish in praise of both. Her maid again was always repeating to her what Brimacott, then her husband's soldier-servant, said of the devotion of the men to the captain.

Finally there came the crowning happiness of the birth of the children; and she still remembered seeing a little knot of troopers gathered round the diminutive creatures called d.i.c.k and Elsie.

But, very soon after, came the miserable day when the regiment was ordered on active service, and she rode with her husband at the head of his troop to the rendezvous. She could see him still as he appeared mounted on Billy Pitt that day. Then followed the embarkation of men and horses, and a desperate struggle with Billy, who objected to be slung on board; and finally the last glimpse of sails disappearing over the horizon and the long drive westward to Bracefort Hall. There old Mr. Bracefort's delight over her arrival and over the children had almost brought happiness back to her again; and cheerful letters from Spain kept hope alive. But when the regiment reached the front, the tragedy of war soon made itself felt. George Fitzdenys was badly wounded in the first skirmish, two of the best troopers were killed and others wounded; and, after that, twelve months of service seemed to cut off member after member of what Fitzdenys had called the happiest troop in the Army. The little cornet was shot dead, the troop-sergeant-major drowned while crossing a treacherous ford, this trooper maimed for life, that trooper--but she could not bear to think of it. And then came the morning in August when old Mr. Bracefort had come in white and trembling to break to her the news of Salamanca. It was well that in those dreary days she had been obliged to look after him and give him the comfort which he tried, but in vain, to give to her. She remembered how, for all his courage, the old gentleman had drooped and died after the death of his son, and how all ties with the old life seemed to be severed, but for George Fitzdenys' letters of sympathy.

Then she recalled the arrival of Brimacott and Billy Pitt, which seemed to mark the end of one stage of her life and the beginning of a new, and yet to carry the last relics of the past continuously into the present. All had been peaceful since then; the war had done its worst for her, and her only link with Spain now lay in the messages, always punctually delivered by old Lord Fitzdenys in person, that Captain Fitzdenys sent his respectful service to her and hoped that she and the children were well. She remembered how she had dreaded her first meeting with Captain Fitzdenys after the peace, and how he seemed to have realised that her whole life now lay in the children, and had made friends with them at once. He had helped her through some difficulties of business and had then rushed off to the campaign of Waterloo; and he had come back safe and sound only to run away again after a few months to India. And now he was back once more, in time to be of help to her; but d.i.c.k must go to school and the happy home must be broken up again.

She sighed sadly, wondering where it all would end.

In this frame of mind she returned and sat in the hall waiting for the children to come back. Six o'clock came, and there was no sign of them. The long twilight faded slowly without a sound of hoofs on the drive; seven o'clock struck; and she rang the bell and asked if nothing had been seen of the Corporal and the children. The answer was "Nothing;" and she waited in growing anxiety, listening for the trample of the ponies or the sound of the children's voices, but hearing only the ticking of the clock; until unable to endure the suspense, she went out and walked first into the yard and then into the road by which they should come. The night was fine, but overcast by light clouds of grey mist, through which the moon pierced but very faintly. More than once her hopes were raised by the sound of hoofs, and dashed to the ground by the drone of wheels or by the appearance of a fat farmer jogging home. She asked more than one if they had seen a man on a brown horse and two children on ponies, but they only answered "no," and wished her civilly good night. In this way the rumour pa.s.sed through the village that the Corporal and the children were missing; and many wondered, but made no doubt that they would be back presently. As Lady Eleanor came back to the house, the clock struck eight, and she returned to the Hall with a deadly sinking at her heart. A quarter of an hour later, she heard the Corporal's step, limping heavier than usual, and jumped to her feet; and the Corporal came in, looking white and haggard and weary, but braced himself to his usual erect att.i.tude when he saw her, and stood at attention.

Then he told his story quietly and clearly. They had ridden right up to the highest point of a ridge, as they had designed, to look over the moor to the coast of Wales; and while they were standing there a deer had come by, and they had ridden down a little further to see what should come next. And then the hounds had come up in full cry and only half-a-dozen hors.e.m.e.n, among whom was Colonel Fitzdenys, anywhere near them. Old Billy was so much excited that the Corporal could hardly hold him, and at last the old horse fairly bolted away with him and the two ponies after him. The Corporal had managed to pull up Billy, but the two ponies had shot past him, both the children crying out with delight, and while galloping on to catch them Billy had come down in a boggy place, and the corporal supposed that he himself must have been a bit stunned, for when he got up he found that he had let go of his rein and that Billy and everybody else had disappeared. He had followed the tracks of the horse as well as he could and had found him in the next combe by the water, but had had a deal of trouble to catch him; and though he had shouted and holloaed for the children he had neither seen nor heard anything of them. Then as soon as he had ridden to the top of the hill again, the mist came down thick and heavy, and there was no seeing anything. So with some trouble he found his way back to the road, being obliged to travel slowly, as the old horse had lamed himself. He had left word at every house that he pa.s.sed, and parties had gone up the road in the valley with lanterns. "I hope and trust, my Lady," said the Corporal in conclusion, "that Master d.i.c.k and Miss Elsie have followed the hunt to the end, for his honour the colonel will see to them. A man that I met on the road promised to carry a message to Fitzdenys Court, but the deer was travelling fast, so I doubt if the colonel will come home to-night unless so be as he must.

But, if you please, my Lady, I'll just take another horse and ride over to the Court myself."

"Can nothing more be done?" said Lady Eleanor, calmed in spite of herself by the Corporal's calmness and forethought.

"Nothing, I fear, my Lady," he answered sadly; "it's terrible thick out over."

"But you are hurt," said Lady Eleanor, noticing the paleness of his face, and the effort which it cost him to walk.

"It's nothing, my Lady," he said. "I'd sooner have lost both legs than that this should have come." And he bowed and limped out; but within an hour and a half he came galloping back with Colonel George, who had met him on the road, and was hurrying over to say that though he had ridden to the death of the hunted stag he had seen nothing of the children then nor at any other time.

"Is the fog as thick on the moor as they say?" asked Lady Eleanor, speaking bravely, though she was white to the lips.

"So thick that without a compa.s.s I could not have found my way across it," said Colonel George. "It is right that you should know the truth.

But the farmers on the edge of the moor know what has happened and are riding as far as they dare with whistles and horns--Brimacott saw to that--and I propose to join them myself at once."

"I shall go with you," said Lady Eleanor, quietly.

Colonel George hesitated for a moment and then answered as quietly: "Be it so; then you must ride my horse, which is cleverer on the moor than any of yours. I will take my groom's, and you must let him have a horse to take back some directions from me to Fitzdenys. Brimacott, with your permission, shall watch the road by which you drove out this morning, in case the ponies should find their way there."

Lady Eleanor soon came down in her habit, impatient to start, but found Colonel George writing, with a tray of food and drink set down by him.

"You cannot start until you have eaten something," was all that he said. "We may have a long ride and a long watch before us;" and Lady Eleanor gulped down a few morsels, for she felt, while hardly knowing why, that Colonel George had taken command and that she must obey orders. In a few minutes he finished writing and sent the letter back to Fitzdenys Court. Then he slung a field-gla.s.s over his shoulders; and Lady Eleanor's heart sank low as she walked with him to the door, for she perceived that he expected the search to be prolonged beyond the night. "Courage," he said, as if reading her thoughts; and they went out and rode away together into the dark.

CHAPTER VIII

And what had become of d.i.c.k and Elsie? The account given by the Corporal had, of course, been perfectly true. It was d.i.c.k who had been the first to see the hunted stag about a quarter of a mile away, travelling along at that steady lurching gallop which seems so slow and is so astonishingly swift; and it had needed all the Corporal's firmness to keep the boy from galloping after him on the spot. And then after a time the hounds had come on upon the line of the deer, their great white bodies conspicuous as they strode on in long drawn file across the waste of pale green gra.s.s, and the sound of their deep voices booming faintly over the vast solitude. Surely and steadily they pressed on, seeming like the deer to move but slowly, but in reality running their hardest with a swinging relentless stride. There was something almost dreamlike in this strange procession as it moved on between green earth and blue heaven, with none to see it, as it appeared, but the white-winged curlew which whistled mournfully overhead. But presently a little group of hors.e.m.e.n appeared on the far side of the hounds, just six of them in all. The old huntsman was leading them, in his long skirted coat and double-peaked cap, as d.i.c.k had often seen him, with his little legs thrust forward, his old body bent over his saddle-bow, and his eyes glued to his hounds. Just a few yards from him rode Colonel George, erect and easy, but also evidently with no eyes for anything but the hounds; and close after him came three more, while the sixth was a full hundred yards behind.

And all the time the Corporal and the children kept moving down, as if drawn by some fascination, insensibly closer to them. Old Billy was worrying at his bit and dancing about, and the ponies squeaking and dancing round him; until for the sake of peace the Corporal allowed the old horse to move in the direction which he desired, when an impatient trot soon turned after a few huge strides to an impatient canter, and Billy put his head down and was off. And off the ponies went also, for they had taken the bit in their teeth and meant to catch the hindmost of the hors.e.m.e.n if they could; and neither d.i.c.k nor Elsie turned their heads, or they would have seen Billy plunge deep into a patch of bog, and come down heavily, throwing the Corporal far over his head. So on they went, flying down the long slope before them, dashed across a little stream at its foot in hot pursuit of the last of the hors.e.m.e.n, and on again along a little track on the other side. The ascent was a little steep beyond the stream, but the ponies struggled gamely up, and then another long slope stretched downward before them, beyond which rose a great bank of heather. The hounds had already reached the heather and were breasting the ascent, but their voices could be heard now and then, and the last of the hors.e.m.e.n was not many hundred yards ahead. So away the ponies went again, the children nothing loth, for they doubted not but that the Corporal was near them. By the time that they reached the foot of the slope the ponies were beginning to roll a little, but they splashed through the next little stream as lively as ever, and began to gallop up through the heather on the other side.

The horseman whom the children were following was still just in sight, hugging his horse up the ascent; but first his horse's tail disappeared over the hill, then only his shoulders were visible, then only his hat, and presently he vanished from sight altogether. And d.i.c.k hustled his pony up the hill to catch him, and Elsie hustled hers after him; but the feeble gallop soon became a slow trot, and the trot became feebler and feebler in spite of all the hustling. Before long both ponies were sobbing heavily, and it was only with great difficulty that the children kept them going fast enough to regain sight of their leader.

Presently the ponies came to a dead stop, and d.i.c.k looked about him for the Corporal; but the Corporal was nowhere to be seen.

As a matter of fact the Corporal at that moment was just rising to his feet, and wondering whether he was on his head or his heels. For old Billy on finding himself in the bog had plunged madly about, girth-deep, until he had pumped all the wind out of himself, when he had waited quietly to recover his breath and floundered out on to the sound ground, shaking such a shower of brown drops over the Corporal as brought him to himself and made him stagger to his feet, rub his eyes, and remember where he was. He soon made out in which direction Billy was gone and presently caught sight of him, making his way to the water to drink; but the horse was not going to let himself be caught at once, and led the Corporal a long dance down by the water-side, where, of course, he could see nothing of the children, though he kept hallooing from time to time in the hope that they would hear him.

And meanwhile the children looked round and round, wondering where they had come from and where they should go to. They had not the least idea where they were, and they could see no one and hear no one; but they laid their heads together and decided that they had better go on to the top of the hill before them, from which, as d.i.c.k said, they would be able to see further. So as soon as the ponies had recovered their wind they went on upward, and presently to their delight they saw far ahead of them the horseman whom they had followed, no longer moving but stopped still. They hustled the ponies into a gallop once more, when to their dismay the man began to move slowly on away from them. They called out at the top of their voices but could not make him hear, in fact he seemed rather to quicken his pace. So they drove the ponies on again, not noticing that tufts of gra.s.s were beginning to show themselves in the heather over which they rode. Then the man suddenly turned to his left and went galloping on, and the children turned also to catch him by cutting off the corner; but the ponies seemed unable to travel very fast, and presently d.i.c.k's pony after some desperate floundering came right down on his nose, shooting the boy gently over his ears, where he landed with his head and shoulders in a shallow pool of brown peaty water.

d.i.c.k jumped to his feet at once, for he was not a bit frightened, and caught the pony easily; but he felt a little humiliated, for he could just see that his white collar was stained with brown mud, and he did not like the trickling of the water down his back. It took him a few minutes to repair damages, and when he put his foot into the stirrup to jump up again, the saddle began to turn round on the pony's back, and he had to jump down again hastily and try to set the saddle right while Elsie held the pony's rein. But while he was heaving with all his little strength, the pony's back suddenly sank before him, and Elsie cried out that Stonecrop (for that was the pony's name) was going to lie down. Like a wise little woman she gave the rein a jerk, which brought Stonecrop's head up and kept him on his legs; but Stonecrop was so much annoyed that he whisked round and tugged so hard at the rein that he drew it over his head; and d.i.c.k had only just time to catch hold of it before Elsie was obliged to let go, for fear of being pulled out of her saddle. Then Stonecrop, who was now still more annoyed and had quite recovered his wind, refused for a long time to allow the rein to be put over his head again, but kept dodging and backing until he drove Elsie almost to despair. At last he backed into some soft ground where he could not move very quickly, and d.i.c.k threw the rein over his head; after which Stonecrop decided to behave himself, and actually stood still for a moment to let d.i.c.k mount him. The saddle very nearly turned round as he did so, but Elsie held on stoutly to the stirrup on the other side, and, once mounted, d.i.c.k soon set the saddle straight again by his weight; but both of the children were wearied and disheartened by all these misfortunes, for Stonecrop had kept them waiting by his antics for more than half an hour.

Then they looked about them again for some one to guide them, and particularly for the Corporal; but the Corporal, as luck would have it, though he was trying his best to find them, never came within eyesight or earshot of them. Besides, Billy was so lame that he could not ride him very fast, and the Corporal himself was not so sure of his way but that he had to keep looking out sharply to remember where he was. So seeing no help d.i.c.k and Elsie made up their minds that they must try to find their own way home, though they had little idea in which direction to start, for they had never been so far on the moor before. The rolling hills and gra.s.s and heather seemed to be very much the same on every side, and there was no road nor track to guide them. d.i.c.k did indeed think of following the hoof-marks of their own ponies backward, for he had heard the Corporal tell stories how lost and tired soldiers had rejoined an army on the march by sticking to its tracks; but unfortunately this was not very easy. Very soon they made up their minds that the first thing to be done was to get clear of the treacherous ground on which they stood, for the ponies floundered terribly, and in one desperate scramble over a very soft place d.i.c.k let his whip fall and could not find it again. Still on they went, and at last came to a little trickle of water in a hollow, running between what seemed to be sound green gra.s.s; but the ponies refused to cross it; and it was well that they did so, for it was deeper and more dangerous than any ground that they had yet traversed. So there was nothing for it but to follow the water in the hope that the ground would improve; and accordingly they did follow it, upward. The stream grew smaller and smaller, and d.i.c.k hugged himself with the idea that when it disappeared altogether they would be able to travel faster.

But, on the contrary, the ground grew worse instead of better, for water underground makes worse foothold than water flowing honestly above, and very soon they lost all sense of their direction in the difficulty of keeping the ponies on their legs at all. At last after several very unpleasant struggles they luckily found their way out of the worst of the bog; but there seemed to be no end to the tract of mixed gra.s.s and heather, which is always treacherous to ride over; and the ponies were constantly in difficulties. Then to d.i.c.k's joy at last they came upon tracks of a horse or pony, and there was something to guide them, though it was very often difficult to find and follow it.

They wandered on, however, until d.i.c.k's eye caught the gleam of silver, and there lay his lost whip; so that, after all their riding, they had but wandered round and round and come back to the place from which they had started.

Poor Elsie, who was getting very tired, was very much disheartened, but d.i.c.k choked down his vexation and disappointment, for it was at any rate something for him to recover his whip, which he valued greatly.

Stonecrop was too much blown now to give much trouble, so he jumped off and picked it up safely, and then he and Elsie held a long consultation, and at last agreed to make straight for a high hill towards which the sun was sinking. So they turned their ponies' heads towards it, and started again, keeping their eyes steadily on a mound or barrow on the hill-top. In a short time they found themselves clear of the boggy ground; and the ponies stepped out so bravely that they felt sure that they were going right. So they trotted on, greatly encouraged, and came to a stream babbling over its bed of yellow stones, though the ground beyond it was so steep that they were obliged to follow it for some distance before they could find a way across.

Thus they were compelled to move slowly, and Elsie suddenly gave a little shiver, and both she and d.i.c.k realised that the air was grown chill and that the light was beginning to fail. Still they pressed the ponies on, and at last they caught sight again of the barrow on the hill, though, to their disappointment, it seemed little nearer than before. Then even while they watched it, a great bank of gray mist suddenly came rolling out of the west and blotted out the barrow and the ridge on which it stood. Still they rode on towards the same point, until, almost before they knew it, the mist was upon them and they could not see fifty yards away. Their hearts sank within them as the darkness gathered round them, but though they drew closer together they said nothing, for the ponies still travelled on with confidence, and they hoped that all the while they were drawing nearer to the barrow. But the mist struck damp and cold through them, weary and fasting as they were, and they had much ado to keep up each other's spirits. So they wandered on, until the ponies, as if they felt that their little riders had lost resolution, came to a dead stop. A keen breeze came out of the west, chilling the two children to the bone; and Stonecrop turning his head to the wind broke out into a long wailing whinny, which brought home to the children such a sense of their loneliness and desolation that Elsie looked blankly at d.i.c.k and d.i.c.k as blankly at Elsie, and neither found heart to say a word.

So they sat in their saddles for a minute or two silent and hopeless, when suddenly both ponies p.r.i.c.ked their ears and snuffed at the wind, and Stonecrop again raised a loud but more cheerful whinny. And out of the mist faint and far distant came the sound of a whinny in answer.

Then Elsie stopped, checked the tears that were rising to her eyes, and looked at d.i.c.k, who was listening intently. He had some thought of jumping off and saying his prayers, except that he was not sure how Stonecrop would behave; but, even while he reflected, Stonecrop's knees began to bend as if to lie down again, and then he caught hold of the pony by the head and gave him a cut with his whip that drove him on in a hurry. "Come along, Elsie," he said resolutely, "if we can reach that horse we may find some one to help us. Perhaps it may be Billy."

And off he went dead up wind at a good round pace, which warmed them both and put them into better heart; and d.i.c.k broke into a cantering song which the Corporal had taught him, and sang it in time to Stonecrop's pace.

"_Oh, a soldier's son, and a soldier's son, He must never go back, but always go on.