Slain By The Doones | Page 9

blowing
of a wind that had picked up the roaring of mankind upon its way.
Perhaps greater noise had never arisen upon the moor; and the cattle,
and the quiet sheep, and even the wild deer came bounding from
unsheltered places into any offering of branches, or of other heling
from the turbulence of men. And then a gray fog rolled down the valley,
and Deborah said it was cannon-smoke, following the river course; but
to me it seemed only the usual thickness of the air, when the clouds
hang low. Thomas Pring was gone, as behooved an ancient warrior, to
see how his successors did things, and the boy Dick Hutchings had
begged leave to sit in a tree and watch the smoke. Deborah and I were
left alone, and a long and anxious day we had.
At last the wood-pigeons had stopped their cooing,--which they kept up
for hours, when the weather matched the light,--and there was not a tree
that could tell its own shadow, and we were contented with the gentle
sounds that come through a forest when it falls asleep, and Deborah
Pring, who had taken a motherly tendency toward me now, as if to
make up for my father, was sitting in the porch with my hands in her

lap, and telling me how to behave henceforth, as if the whole world
depended upon that, when we heard a swishing sound, as of branches
thrust aside, and then a low moan that went straight to my heart, as I
thought of my father when he took the blow of death.
"My son, my Bob, my eldest boy!" cried Mistress Pring, jumping up
and falling into my arms, like a pillow full of wire, for she insisted
upon her figure still. But before I could do anything to help her----
"Hit her on the back, ma'am; hit her hard upon the back. That is what
always brings mother round," was shouted, as I might say, into my ear
by the young man whom she was lamenting.
"Shut thy trap, Braggadose. To whom art thou speaking? Pretty much
thou hast learned of war to come and give lessons to thy father!
Mistress Sylvia, it is for thee to speak. Nothing would satisfy this
young springal but to bring his beaten captain here, for the sake of
mother's management. I told un that you would never take him in, for
his father have taken in you pretty well! Captain Purvis of the Somerset
I know not what--for the regiments now be all upside down.
Raggiments is the proper name for them. Very like he be dead by this
time, and better die out of doors than in. Take un away, Bob. No
hospital here!"
"Thomas Pring, who are you," I said, for the sound of another low
groan came through me, "to give orders to your master's daughter? If
you bring not the poor wounded gentleman in, you shall never come
through this door yourself."
"Ha, old hunks, I told thee so!" The young man who spoke raised his
hat to me, and I saw that it had a scarlet plume, such as Marwood de
Wichehalse gloried in. "In with thee, and stretch him that he may die
straight. I am off to Southmolton for Cutcliffe Lane, who can make a
furze-fagot bloom again. My filly can give a land-yard in a mile to Tom
Faggus and his Winnie. But mind one thing, all of you; it was none of
us that shot the captain, but his own good men. Farewell, Mistress
Sylvia!" With these words he made me a very low bow, and set off for
his horse at the corner of the wood--as reckless a gallant as ever broke

hearts, and those of his own kin foremost; yet himself so kind and
loving.
CHAPTER V.
--MISTAKEN AIMS.
Captain Purvis, now brought to the Warren in this very sad condition,
had not been shot by his own men, as the dashing Marwood de
Wichehalse said; neither was it quite true to say that he had been shot
by anyone. What happened to him was simply this: While behaving
with the utmost gallantry and encouraging the militia of Somerset,
whose uniforms were faced with yellow, he received in his chest a
terrific blow from the bottom of a bottle. This had been discharged
from a culveria on the opposite side of the valley by the brave but
impetuous sons of Devon, who-wore the red facings, and had taken
umbrage at a pure mistake on the part of their excellent friends and
neighbours, the loyal band of Somerset. Either brigade had three
culverins; and never having seen such things before, as was natural
with good farmers' sons, they felt it a compliment to themselves to be
intrusted with such danger,