Part 57

‘What are you doing, O Flesh and Blood, And what’s your foolish will, That you must break into Minepit Wood And wake the Folk of the Hill?’

‘Oh, we’ve broke into Lord Pelham’s park, And killed Lord Pelham’s deer, And if ever you heard a little dog bark You’ll know why we come here!’

‘We ask you let us go our way, As fast as we can flee, For if ever you heard a bloodhound bay, You’ll know how pressed we be.’

‘Oh, lay your crossbows on the bank And drop the knife from your hand, And though the hounds are at your flank I’ll save you where you stand!’ They laid their crossbows on the bank, They threw their knives in the wood, And the ground before them opened and sank And saved ‘em where they stood. ‘Oh, what’s the roaring in our ears That strikes us well-nigh dumb?’ ‘Oh, that is just how things appears According as they come.’

‘What are the stars before our eyes That strike us well-nigh blind?’ ‘Oh, that is just how things arise According as you find.’

‘And why’s our bed so hard to the bones Excepting where it’s cold?’ ‘Oh, that’s because it is precious stones Excepting where ‘tis gold.

‘Think it over as you stand For I tell you without fail, If you haven’t got into Fairyland You’re not in Lewes Gaol.’

All night long they thought of it, And, come the dawn, they saw They’d tumbled into a great old pit, At the bottom of Minepit Shaw.

And the keepers’ hound had followed ‘em close And broke her neck in the fall; So they picked up their knives and their cross-bows And buried the dog. That’s all.

But whether the man was a poacher too Or a Pharisee so bold-- I reckon there’s more things told than are true, And more things true than are told.

The Tree of Justice

It was a warm, dark winter day with the Sou’-West wind singing through Dallington Forest, and the woods below the Beacon. The children set out after dinner to find old Hobden, who had a three months’ job in the Rough at the back of Pound’s Wood. He had promised to get them a dormouse in its nest. The bright leaf Still clung to the beech coppice; the long chestnut leaves lay orange on the ground, and the rides were speckled with scarlet-lipped sprouting acorns. They worked their way by their own short cuts to the edge of Pound’s Wood, and heard a horse’s feet just as they came to the beech where Ridley the keeper hangs up the vermin. The poor little fluffy bodies dangled from the branches--some perfectly good, but most of them dried to twisted strips.

‘Three more owls,’ said Dan, counting. ‘Two stoats, four jays, and a kestrel. That’s ten since last week. Ridley’s a beast.’

‘In my time this sort of tree bore heavier fruit.’ Sir Richard Dalyngridge reined up his grey horse, Swallow, in the ride behind them. [This is the Norman knight they met the year before in PUCK OF POOK’S HILL. See ‘Young Men at the Manor,’ ‘The Knights of the Joyous Venture,’ and ‘Old Men at Pevensey,’ in that book.] ‘What play do you make?’ he asked.

‘Nothing, Sir. We’re looking for old Hobden,’ Dan replied.’He promised to get us a sleeper.’

‘Sleeper? A DORMEUSE, do you say?’

‘Yes, a dormouse, Sir.’ ‘I understand. I passed a woodman on the low grounds. Come!’ He wheeled up the ride again, and pointed through an opening to the patch of beech-stubs, chestnut, hazel, and birch that old Hobden would turn into firewood, hop-poles, pea-boughs, and house-faggots before spring. The old man was as busy as a beaver.

Something laughed beneath a thorn, and Puck stole out, his finger on his lip.

‘Look!’ he whispered. ‘Along between the spindle-trees. Ridley has been there this half-hour.’

The children followed his point, and saw Ridley the keeper in an old dry ditch, watching Hobden as a cat watches a mouse.

‘Huhh!’ cried Una. ‘Hobden always ‘tends to his wires before breakfast. He puts his rabbits into the faggots he’s allowed to take home. He’ll tell us about ‘em tomorrow.’

‘We had the same breed in my day,’ Sir Richard replied, and moved off quietly, Puck at his bridle, the children on either side between the close-trimmed beech stuff.

‘What did you do to them?’ said Dan, as they repassed Ridley’s terrible tree.

‘That!’ Sir Richard jerked his head toward the dangling owls.

‘Not he!’ said Puck. ‘There was never enough brute Norman in you to hang a man for taking a buck.’

‘I--I cannot abide to hear their widows screech. But why am I on horseback while you are afoot?’ He dismounted lightly, tapped Swallow on the chest, so that the wise thing backed instead of turning in the narrow ride, and put himself at the head of the little procession. He walked as though all the woods belonged to him. ‘I have often told my friends,’ he went on, ‘that Red William the King was not the only Norman found dead in a forest while he hunted.’

‘D’you mean William Rufus?’ said Dan.

‘Yes,’ said Puck, kicking a clump of red toad-stools off a dead log.