A Boys Ride | Page 2

into the inner one followed by the wounded dog. Here the men-at-arms were dismounting, horses were neighing, and grooms running about. The boy, too, dismounted, and bent anxiously over his dog.
Presently a young voice demanded, "Whence comest thou?"
The boy looked up to see his counterpart, the son of the lord of the castle, standing imperiously before him.
"From York," answered the stranger, briefly. "Hast thou a leech that can care for my dog? See how he bleeds."
"Oh, ay," was the answer. "But how came he wounded? He hath been deer-stealing, perchance, and the ranger hath discovered him."
"Nay," replied the strange lad, in tones the echo of his questioner's. "Thou doest Fleetfoot wrong. We were but pursuing our way when from yonder thicket to the north and adjoining the open, a flight of arrows came. I had been sped myself but for my shirt of mail."
The leech had now advanced and was caring skilfully for the dog while the strange lad looked on, now and then laying a caressing hand on the hound's head.
Meanwhile the men-at-arms conferred together and exchanged wise looks while a stout and clumsy Saxon serving-man of about forty shook his head. "I did dream of an earthquake no longer ago than night before last," he said, "which is a dream that doth ever warn the dreamer and all concerned with him to be cautious and careful. Here cometh riding the twin of our young lord: and the Evil One only knoweth how this stranger hath the nose, the eyes, the mouth, the complexion, the gait, the size, and the voice of our young lord, Josceline De Aldithely. Thinkest thou not, William Lorimer, it were cautious and careful to put him and his hound outside the walls, to say nothing of his horse?"
William Lorimer, the captain of the men-at-arms, smiled in derision. A great belief in dreams and omens was abroad in the land: and nowhere had it a more devoted adherent than in Humphrey, the Saxon serving-man, and nowhere a greater scoffer than in William Lorimer.
"I see thou scoffest, William Lorimer," pursued Humphrey. "But were he put out, then might those minions of the king shoot at him once more, and spare to shoot at our young lord. I will away to our lady, and see what she ordereth."
There had always been times in England when no man who stood in the way of another was safe, but these were the times when women and children were not safe. For perhaps the wickedest king who ever sat upon the English throne occupied it now, and his name was John.
This king had tried to snatch the kingdom from his brother, Richard Coeur de Lion, and had failed. When Richard was dead, and John was made king in his stead, there was still another claimant to the throne,--his nephew Arthur,--and him the king in 1204 had murdered, so report said, with his own hand. This was the deed that lost him Normandy and all his other French possessions, and shut him up to rule in England alone. And the English soon had enough of him. He was now in a conflict with the Pope, who had commanded him to receive Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury. This John had refused to do. Now, the kingdom, on account of the king's disobedience, was under the papal interdict, and the king was threatened with excommunication.
England had at this time many, many churches, and their bells, before this unfortunate situation, had seemed to be ringing all day long. They rang to call the people to the ordinary church services; they rang to call them to work, and to bid them cease from work. They rang when a baby was born, and when there was a death. And for many other things they rang. Now, under the interdict, no bell rang. There were no usual church services, and everywhere was fasting. A strange England it seemed.
The king had never gotten on well with his barons, and they hated him. Nevertheless they would have stood by him if he had been at all just to them. And surely he needed them to stand by him, for all the world was against him. The French were eager to fight him, and the Church was arrayed against him. But all these things only made the king harder and more unjust to the barons because just now they were the only ones in his power, and his wicked heart was full of rage. He had hit upon one means of punishing them which they all could feel,--he struck them through their wives and children. Some of the barons were obliged to flee from England for their lives. Many were obliged to give the king their sons as pledges of their loyalty. In every man's knowledge was the sad