“Help! help! holloa there!
Master Walter Mr Amos Jim Harry quick
bring us a light! lend a hand here!”
Such were the words which suddenly broke the stillness
of a dark October night, and roused up the household
of Mr Walter Huntingdon, a country gentleman living
on his own estate in Derbyshire. The voice was
the coachman’s, and came apparently from somewhere
near the drive-gate, which was about a couple of hundred
yards from the front door of the house. The evening
had been dark and stormy; and it was in a lull of
the tempest that the ominous sounds of distress reached
the ears of the inmates of Flixworth Manor.
In a few moments all was bustle and
excitement lights flashing; feet hurrying;
voices shouting; and then a rush for the scene of danger
and trouble.
Outside the grounds in which the Manor-house
stood were extensive grass lands on either side of
the public road. In the field nearest to the
drive-gate, and on the left as you entered it, was
a deep and precipitous chalk-pit, now disused.
This pit was some little distance from the road itself,
and was not noticeable by persons unacquainted with
the locality. It had been there no one knew how
long, and was a favourite resort of adventurous children,
a footpath to the village passing not far from its
edge. Towards this chalk-pit the startled party
of rescue from the house hurried with one consent,
several of them carrying lanterns or extemporised
torches.
Ten o’clock was striking in
the distant church-tower as they gathered round the
spot from which the cries for help had proceeded.
A terrible sight was dimly revealed to them in the
uncertain glare cast upon it by the lights which they
carried. Hanging over the edge of the chalk-pit
was the squire’s carriage. One horse had
broken away from the traces, but the other was struggling
violently, and seemed likely, in its plungings, to
force the carriage still further over the precipitous
side of the pit. The coachman, who had managed
to spring unharmed from the box, was doing his best
to restrain the violence of the terrified animal,
but with only partial success; while the situation
of Mr Huntingdon himself and of his maiden sister,
who were inside the carriage, was perilous and distressing
in the extreme.
The accident had been caused by a
strange and savage dog suddenly springing at the horses’
heads as the carriage was nearing the outer gate.
The night was very dark, and the horses, which were
young and full of spirit, being startled by the unexpected
attack of the dog, which belonged to some passing
traveller, sprang violently out of the road, and,
easily crashing through the wooden fence, which happened
to be unusually weak just at that part, carried the
carriage along with them to the very edge of the chalk-pit,
spite of all the efforts of the coachman to hold them
in; so that when the people of the Manor-house came
to the rescue, they found the carriage and its occupants
in a most critical position.
Not a moment was to be lost.
Jim, the stable-boy, was quickly by the side of the
coachman, who was almost exhausted with his efforts
to curb the terrified horse, the animal becoming still
more excited by the flare of the lights and the rush
of the newcomers.
“Cut the traces, man! cut the
traces!” cried Harry the butler, as he gained
the spot.
“Do nothing of the sort,”
said a voice close by him. “Don’t
you see that there may be nothing to hold the carriage
up, if you cut the traces? it may fall sheer over
into the chalk-pit. Steady, Beauty! steady,
poor Beauty!” These last words came from a young
man who evidently had authority over the servants,
and spoke calmly but firmly, at the same time patting
and soothing the terror-stricken animal, which, though
still trembling in every limb, had ceased its frantic
plungings.
“William,” continued the
same speaker, addressing the coachman, “keep
her still, if you can, till we have got my father and
aunt out.”
Just at that moment a boy of about
seventeen years of age sprang on to the front wheel,
which was a little tilted on one side, and with a
violent wrench opened the carriage-door. “Father,
dear father,” he cried, “are you there?
are you hurt?”
For a moment no reply was made; then
in a stifled voice came the words, “Save your
aunt, my dear boy, save your aunt!”
Miss Huntingdon, who was nearest the
door, and had contrived to cling to a stout strap
at the side of it, was now dragged with difficulty,
by the joint efforts of her nephew and the butler,
out on to the firm ground. Walter, her young
deliverer, then sprang back to extricate his father.
“Give me your hand, father,” he cried,
as he stooped down into the carriage, which was now
creaking and swaying rather ominously. “A
light here, Harry Jim!” he continued.
It was plain that there was no time for delay, as
the vehicle seemed to be settling down more and more
in the direction of the chasm over which it hung.
A light was quickly brought, and Mr Huntingdon was
released at last from his trying and painful durance;
but not without considerable difficulty, as he had
been much bruised, and almost stunned, by being dashed
against the undermost door, and by his poor sister
having been thrown violently on him, when the carriage
had turned suddenly on its side.
“Hip, hip, hurrah!” shouted
Walter, springing on to the hind wheel; “`all’s
well that ends well.’ No bones broken I
hope, dear father, dear aunt.”
“Have a care, Master Walter,”
cried the coachman, who had now managed, with the
elder son’s help, to release the frightened horse
from the traces, and had given it in charge to the
stable-boy, “have a care, or you’ll
be over into the chalk-pit, carriage and all.”
“All right, William,”
cried the boy; “you look after Beauty, and I’ll
look after myself.” So saying, he jumped
down, making the carriage rock as he sprang to the
ground.
And now, while Miss Huntingdon, who
had suffered nothing more serious than a severe shaking,
was being led to the house by her elder nephew and
the female servants who had joined the rescuing party,
Mr Huntingdon, having made a careful inspection of
the position of his carriage, found that it was in
no danger of falling to the bottom of the chalk-pit,
as a stout tree, which sprang from the side of the
pit, close to the top, had become entangled in the
undermost hind wheel, and would form a sufficient
support till the proper means of drawing the vehicle
fully on to the level ground could be used on the morrow.
All parties then betook themselves slowly to the
Manor-house.
In the kitchen, William the coachman
was, of course, the great centre of attraction to
a large gathering of domestics, and of neighbours also,
who soon came flocking in, spite of the lateness of
the hour, to get an authentic version of the accident,
which, snowball-like, would, ere noon next day, get
rolled up into gigantic proportions, as it made its
way through many mouths to the farther end of the
parish.
In the drawing-room of the Manor-house
a sympathising group gathered round Mr Huntingdon
and his sister, eager to know if either were seriously
the worse for the alarming termination to their journey.
Happily, both had escaped without damage of any consequence,
so that before they retired to rest they were able,
as they drew round the cheery fire, and heard the
stormy wind raging without, to talk over the perilous
adventure with mutual congratulations at its happy
termination, and with thankfulness that the travellers
were under the shelter of the Manor roof, instead
of being exposed to the rough blasts of the storm,
as they might still have been had the mishap occurred
further from home. “Walter, my boy,”
exclaimed Mr Huntingdon, stretching out his hand to
his younger son, “it was bravely done.
If it had not been for you, we might have been hanging
over the mouth of the chalk-pit yet or,
perhaps, been down at the bottom. You are a lad
after your father’s own heart, good
old-fashioned English pluck and courage; there’s
nothing I admire so much.” As he said
these words, his eye glanced for a moment at his eldest
son Amos, who was standing at the outside of the group,
as though he felt that the older brother had no claim
on his regard on the score of courage. The young
man coloured slightly, but made no remark. He
might, had he so pleased, have put in his claim for
loving notice, on the ground of presence of mind in
stilling the plunging horse, presence of
mind, which commonly contributes more to success and
deliverance in an emergency than impulsive and impetuous
courage; but he was not one to assert himself, and
the coachman and stable-boy, who knew the part he
had taken, were not present to speak a word for him.
So his younger brother Walter got the praise, and
was looked upon as the hero of the adventure.