“From all such devils, good Lord, deliver us!” The Taming of the Shrew.

“And now, my men, upon him!” cried Mistress Hazlehurst, backing to make room in which her followers might obey.

These followers tried to push forward; the horses crowded one another, and there ensued much huddling and confusion. But the lantern-bearer, holding his light and his bridle in one hand, caught Mr. Marryott’s bridle with the other. Hal struck this hand down with one of his pistols, which were not prepared for firing. He then drew his sword, with a gesture that threw hesitation into the ranks of his opposers.

“Madam,” he cried, in no very gentle tone, “may I know what is your purpose in this?”

“’Tis to prevent your flight,” she called back, promptly. “The officers of justice are slow; I shall see that you forestall them not.”

For a moment Hal, thinking only of the officers behind him, wondered if she could have heard of the council’s intention, and whether it was to the royal messengers that she alluded.

“What have officers of justice to do with me?” he asked.

“To call you to account for the killing of my brother!”

Sir Valentine’s fight, in which wounds had been given on both sides, again recurred to Hal’s mind.

“Your brother is dead, then?” he inquired.

“I am but now from his funeral!” was her answer.

In that case, Hal deduced, her brother must have died two days before, that is to say, on the very day of the fight. The news must have come belated to the sister, for she had been at the performance of “Hamlet,” yesterday. And here was explanation of her departure from the theatre in the midst of the play. The summons to her dead brother’s side had followed her to the playhouse, and there overtaken her. Afterward, Hal found these inferences to be correct.

For a second or two of mutual inaction, he marvelled at the strange ways of circumstance which had brought this woman, whom he had yesterday admired in the crowded London playhouse, to confront him in such odd relations on this lonely, night-hidden road in Hertfordshire. But a sound that a turn of the wind brought the sound of Roger Barnet’s men riding nearer sharpened him to the necessity of immediate action against this sudden hindrance. Yet he felt loath to go from this woman. Go he must, however, though even at the possible cost of violence to her people.

The Puritan retained his place at Marryott’s side. Kit Bottle was close behind, and with horse already half turned so that he might face Barnet’s men should they come up too soon; he had drawn his sword, and was quietly making ready his pistols.

“Madam,” said Hal, decisively, “I did not kill your brother. Now, by your favor, I will pass, for I am in some haste.”

“What!” she cried. “Did you lie just now, when you said you were Sir Valentine Fleetwood?”

Now, Hal might tell her that he was not Sir Valentine; but, doubtless, she would not believe him; and thus the situation would not be changed. And, on the other hand, if she should believe him, so much the worse, she would then bend her energies toward the hindrance of the real Sir Valentine; would ride on toward Fleetwood house, be met and questioned by Roger Barnet, and set him right, or at least cause him to send a party back to Fleetwood house to investigate. So Hal’s purpose would be speedily frustrated. His only course was to let her think him really the man he was impersonating; indeed that course would make but another step in the continued deception of Roger Barnet, and Hal was bound to take such steps not avoid them for the next five days.

“Mistress Hazlehurst,” replied Hal, taking a kind of furtive joy in using her name upon his lips for the first time, “I do not deny that I am Sir Valentine Fleetwood; but I did not kill your brother. I wish you heaven’s blessing and a good night, for I am going on!” With that he started his horse forward.

“Take him!” she shouted to her men. “Ye shall pay for it an he escape!”

The threat had effect. The attendants crowded upon Hal, some with swords drawn, some with clubs upraised; so that his horse, after a few steps, reared wildly upon its haunches, and sought a way out of the press.

“Back, dogs!” commanded Marryott, striking right and left with sword and pistol. There were cries of pain from men and horses; the men wielded their weapons as best they could; but a way was somehow opened. Mistress Hazlehurst herself was forced against the fence at the roadside, one of her followers a slender, agile youth skilfully interposing his horse and body between her and the crush. She would have pressed into the midst of the blows and of the rearing beasts, had not this servant restrained her horse by means which she, in her excitement, did not perceive. But she continued calling out orders, in a loud, wrathful voice.

As Hal opened way, Anthony and Bottle followed close, preventing the enemy from closing in upon his rear. The Puritan used a short sword with a business-like deliberation and care, and with no word or other vocal sign than a kind of solemnly approbative grunt as he thrust. Bottle, who rode last, handled his long rapier with great swiftness and potency, in all directions, swearing all the while; and finally let off his two pistols, one after the other, at two men who hung with persistence upon Hal’s flanks, while Hal was forcing the last opposition in front. One of these two fell wounded or dead, the other was thrown by his maddened horse; and finally the three fugitives were free of the mass of men and beasts that had barred the way. One of the horses was clattering down the road ahead, without a rider. Hal informed himself by a single glance that Anthony and Kit were free and able, and then, with an “On we go!” he spurred after the riderless horse toward Stevenage.

“After him, you knaves!” screamed Mistress Hazlehurst, in a transport of baffled rage; but her servants, some unhorsed, some with broken heads or pierced bodies, one with a pistol wound in his side, and the rest endeavoring to get the horses under control, were quite heedless of her cries.

“A sad plight to leave a lady in!” said Hal, who had heard her futile order. He and his two men were now riding at a gallop, to regain lost advantage.

“A devil of a woman!” quoth Captain Bottle, in a tone of mere comment, void of any feeling save, perhaps, a little admiration.

“Why did she not know me, either as Sir Valentine, or as not being Sir Valentine?” asked Hal, calling ahead to Anthony, who had resumed his place in front.

“She hath dwelt most time in London with a city kinswoman,” was the answer, “and Sir Valentine hath lived usually in France since she was born.”

“’Tis well Master Barnet knew Sir Valentine better, or knew him well enough to take me for him in my disguise,” said Hal.

“Trust Roger Barnet to know every papist in the kingdom,” called out Kit Bottle, “and to know every one else that’s like to give occasion for his services. It is a pride of his to know the English papists whereever they be. Roger is often on the Continent, look you. He is the privy council’s longest finger!”

“Tell me of this Mistress Hazlehurst,” said Hal to the Puritan, to whose side he now rode up. “Is’t true she is the sister of the gentleman Sir Valentine fought?”

“His only sister,” returned Anthony. “His only close kin. She is now heiress to the Hazlehurst estate, and just old enough to be free of wardship.”

“A strong love she must have borne her brother, to fly straight from his funeral to see him avenged!”

“Nay, I know not any great love betwixt ’em. They could not live in the same house, or in the same county, for their wrangles being both of an ungodly violence. ’Twas her brother’s unrighteous proneness to anger that forced the brawl on Sir Valentine. ’Twas that heathenish quarrelsomeness, some say, that kept Mr. Hazlehurst a bachelor. ’Tis a wonder the evil spirit of wrath in him brought him not sooner to his death. He fought many duels, not hereabouts, where men were careful against provoking him, but in France, where he lived much. ’Twas there, indeed, that he and Sir Valentine best knew each other.”

“And yet this sister must have loved him. Women are not commonly so active toward punishing a brother’s slayer,” insisted Hal.

“Why,” replied Anthony, “methinks this woman is a hothead that must needs do with her own hands what, if she were another woman, she would only wish done. ’Tis a pride of family that moveth her to look to the avenging of her brother’s death. A blow at him she conceiveth to be a blow at herself, the two being of same name and blood. This sister and brother have ever been more quick, one to resent an affront against the other from a third person, than they have been slow to affront each other. I am not wont to speak in the language of the lost, or to apply the name of the arch-enemy to them that bear God’s image; but, indeed, as far as a headstrong will and violent ways are diabolical, yon profane man spoke aptly when he named Mistress Anne a devil of a woman!”

“All’s one for that,” said Hal, curtly. “But, certes, as far as a matchless face and a voice of music are angelical, I speak as aptly when I name this Mistress Anne an angel of a woman! It went against me to leave her in the road thus, in a huddle of bleeding servants and runaway horses.”

“Tis a huddle that will block the way for Roger Barnet a while,” put in Captain Bottle.

“Doubtless he and his men have ridden up to her by now,” replied Marryott. “I’d fain see what is occurring betwixt them.” Then lapsing into silence. Hal and his two attendants rode on, passing through slumbering Stevenage, and continuing uninterruptedly northward.

Barnet’s party had indeed come up to Mistress Hazlehurst’s, and the scene now occurring between them was one destined to have a strange conclusion.

Anne’s followers, raw serving men without the skill or decision to have used rightly their numerical superiority over the three fugitives, all were more or less hurt, except two, the slight one who had personally shielded her, and the lantern-bearer, who had been taken out of the fray by the intractability of his horse. Not only was her escort useless for any immediate pursuit of the supposed Sir Valentine, but the condition of its members required of her, as their mistress and leader, an instant looking to. The necessity of this forbade her own mad impulse to ride unaided after the man who had escaped her, and whom she was the more passionately enraged against because of his victory over her and of his treatment of her servants. Nothing could have been more vexatious than the situation into which she had been brought; and she was bitterly chafing at her defeat, while forcing herself to consider steps for the proper care of her injured servants, when Barnet’s troop came clattering up the road.

Mistress Hazlehurst’s horses, except the runaway, had now been got under command; some of her men, merely bruised in body or head, stood holding them; others, worse hurt, lay groaning at the roadside, whither she had ordered their comrades to drag them. Anne herself sat her horse in the middle of the road, the little fellow, still mounted, at her left hand. Such was the group that caused Barnet and his men to pull up their horses to an abrupt halt. Peering forward, with eyes now habituated to the darkness, the royal pursuivant swiftly inspected the figures before him, perceived that Sir Valentine and his two attendants were not of them, wondered what a woman was doing at the head of such a party, dismissed that question as none of his business, and called out:

“Madam, a gentleman hath passed you, with two men. Did he keep the road to Stevenage, or turn out yonder?”

“Sir Valentine Fleetwood, mean you?” asked Anne, with sudden eagerness.

“The same. Way to pass, please you. And answer.”

Roger Barnet was a man of middle height; bodily, of a good thickness and great solidity; a man with a bold, square face, a frown, cold eyes, a short black beard; a keeper of his own counsel, a man of the fewest possible words, and those gruffly spoken. Anne, because her mind was working upon other matter, took no offence at his sharp, discourteous, mandatory style of addressing her. Without heeding his demand for way, she said:

“Sir Valentine hath indeed passed! See how he dealt with my servants when I tried to stay him! Are you magistrate’s men?”

“I am a messenger of the queen,” said Barnet, deigning an answer because, on looking more closely at her horses, a certain idea had come to him.

“In pursuit of Sir Valentine?” she asked.

“With a warrant for his apprehension,” was the reply.

“What! For my brother’s death? Hath her Majesty heard ”

“For high treason; and if these be your horses, in the queen’s name ”

But Mistress Hazlehurst cut short his speech, in turn.

“High treason!” she cried, with jubilation; and this thought flashed through her mind: that if taken for high treason, her enemy, a Catholic of long residence in France, was a doomed man; whereas a judicial investigation of his quarrel with her brother might absolve Sir Valentine from guilt or blame. True, the state’s revenge for an offence against itself would not, as such, be her revenge for an offence against her family, and would not in itself afford her the triumph she craved; but Sir Valentine was in a way to escape the State’s revenge; she might be an instrument to effect his capture; in being that, she would find her own revenge. She could then truly say to her enemy, “But for me you might be free; of my work, done in retaliation for killing my brother, shall come your death; and so our blood, as much as the crown, is avenged.” All this, never expressed in detail, but conceived in entirety during the time of a breath, was in her mind as she went on:

“God’s light, he shall be caught, then! He went toward Stevenage. I will ride with you!”

“Nay, madam, there are enough of us. But your horses are fresher than ours. I take some of yours, in the queen’s name, and leave mine in your charge.” And he forthwith dismounted, ordering his men to do likewise. But ere he made another movement, his hand happening to seek his pouch, he uttered an oath, and exclaimed:

“The queen’s letters! There’s delay! They must be delivered to-night. Madam, know you where Sir William Crashaw’s house is? And Mr. Richard Brewby’s?”

“Both are down the first road to the right.”

“Then down the first road to the right I must go, and let Sir Valentine Fleetwood gain time while I am about it. Which is your best horse, mistress? And one of your men shall guide me to those gentlemen’s houses.” And, resigning his horse to a follower, he strode into the midst of the Hazlehurst group.

“But why lose this time, sir?” said Anne. “Let my man himself bear these letters.”

“When I am charged with letters,” replied Roger Barnet, “they pass not from me save into the hands for which they are intended. I shall carry these letters, and catch this traitor. By your leave, I take this horse and this and this. Get off, fellow! Hudsdon, bring my saddle, and saddle me this beast. Change horses, the rest of you.”

“But will you not send men after this traitor, while you bear the letters?” queried Anne, making no protest against the pressing of her horses into the queen’s service, a procedure in which no attempt was made to include the horse she herself was on.

Barnet gave a grunt of laughter, to which he added the words, “My men go with me!” Perhaps he dared not trust his men out of his sight, perhaps he wished no one but himself to have the credit of taking the fugitive, perhaps he needed the protection of his complete force against possible attack.

“But, man,” cried Anne, sharply, “you will lose track of Sir Valentine! You will take two hours, carrying those letters!”

“Why, mistress,” replied Barnet, as the change of horses from one party to the other went rapidly on, “will not people in farmhouses and villages hear his three horses pass?” Though he assumed a voice of confidence, there was yet in it a tone betraying that he shared her fears.

“He ought to be followed while he is yet scarce out of hearing,” said Anne, “and overtaken, and hindered one way or another till you catch up.”

Barnet cast a gloomy look at her, as if pained at the mention of a course so excellent, but in the present case so impossible.

“My horse is the best in the county,” she went on. “I can catch him, hang me if I cannot! I can delay him, too, if there be any way under heaven to do so! Dickon, look to thy wounded fellows! See them taken home, and show this gentleman the way to Sir William Crashaw’s and Mr. Brewby’s. Come, Francis!” this to the small attendant who kept always near her “God be praised, you are well-mounted, too!” And she turned her horse’s head toward Stevenage.

“But, Mistress Anne,” cried Dickon, in dismay, “you will be robbed killed! Ride not without company!”

“Let go, Dickon, and do as I bid! I shall ride so fast, the fiend himself cannot catch me, till I fall in with that traitor; and then I shall have him and his men for company till this officer come up to him. Master Messenger, for mine own reasons I promise to impede Sir Valentine; to be a burden, a weight, and a chain upon him, holding him back by all means I can devise, till you bear your letters and o’ertake him. Dickon, heed my orders! Follow me. Francis! Ods-daggers, must I be a milksop, and afraid o’ nights, because I wasn’t born to wear hose instead of petticoats?” And having by this time got her horse clear of the group in the road, she made off toward Stevenage, followed by her mounted page. Francis.

“It may turn out well for us that Sir Valentine Fleetwood happened to kill her brother,” was the only comment of Roger Barnet, as he mounted the horse his man Hudsdon had newly saddled. He had seen much and many, in his time, and was not surprised at anything, especially if it bore the shape of a woman.