The Hot Swamp - Robert Michael Ballantyne (debian ebook reader TXT) 📗

all, you are just in the nick of time. Well, Beniah, what think you of our search to-day? Has it been close? Is it likely that we have missed any of the caves or cliffs where robbers might be hiding?"

"I think not. It seems to me that we have ransacked every hole and corner in which there is a chance that the lad could be found."

"The _lad_!" exclaimed Gadarn.

"I--I mean--your daughter," returned the Hebrew, quickly.

"Why don't you say what you mean, then? One expects a man of your years to talk without confusion--or is it that you are really more anxious about finding the boy than my girl?"

"Nay, that be far from me," answered the Hebrew. "To say truth, I am to the full as anxious to find the one as the other, for it matters not which you--"

"Matters not!" repeated Gadarn, fiercely.

"Well, of course, I mean that my friendship for you and Bladud makes me wish to see you each satisfied by finding both the boy and the girl."

"For my part," said Bladud, quietly, "I sincerely hope that we may find them both, for we are equally anxious to do so."

"Equally!" exclaimed Gadarn, with a look of lofty surprise. "Dost mean to compare your regard for your young friend with a father's love for his only child!"

The prince did not easily take offence, but he could not refrain from a flush and a frown as he replied, sharply--

"I make no useless comparisons, chief. It is sufficient that we are both full of anxiety, and are engaged in the same quest."

"Ay, the same quest--undoubtedly," observed the Hebrew in a grumbling, abstracted manner.

"If it were possible," returned Gadarn, sternly, "to give up the search for your boy and confine it entirely to my girl, I would do so. But as they went astray about the same place, we are compelled, however little we like it, to hunt together."

"Not compelled, chief," cried Bladud, with a look and a flash in his blue eye which presaged a sudden rupture of friendly relations. "We can each go our own way and hunt on our own account."

"Scarcely," replied the chief, "for if you found my daughter, you would be bound in honour to deliver her up; and if I found your boy, I should feel myself bound to do the same."

"It matters not a straw which is found," cried the Hebrew, exasperated at the prospect of a quarrel between the two at such an inopportune moment. "Surely, as an old man, I have the right to remonstrate with you for encouraging anything like disagreement when our success in finding the boy,--I--I mean the girl,--depends--"

A burst of laughter from the chief cut him short.

"You don't seem to be quite sure of what you mean," he cried, "or to be able to say it. Come, come, prince, if the Hebrew claims a right to remonstrate because he is twenty years or so older than I am, surely I may claim the same right, for I am full twenty years older than you. Is it seemly to let your hot young blood boil over at every trifle? Here, let me replenish your platter, for it is ill hunting after man, woman, or beast without a stomach full of victuals."

There was no resisting the impulsive chief.

Both his guests cleared their brows and laughed--though there was still a touch of exasperation in the Hebrew's tone.

While the search was being thus diligently though needlessly prosecuted in the neighbourhood of the Hot Swamp by Gadarn, who was dearly fond of a practical joke, another chief, who was in no joking humour, paid a visit one evening to his mother. Perhaps it is unnecessary to say that this chief was Gunrig.

"From all that I see and hear, mother," he said, walking up and down the room, as was his habit, with his hands behind him, "it is clear that if I do not go about it myself, the king will let the matter drop; for he is convinced that the girl has run off with some fellow, and will easily make her way home."

"Don't you think he may be right, my son?"

"No, I don't, my much-too-wise mother. I know the girl better than that. It is enough to look in her face to know that she could not run away with any fellow!"

"H'm!" remarked the woman significantly.

"What say you?" demanded the chief, sharply.

"I scarcely know what to say. Perhaps the best thing to do would be to take a band of our own men and go off in search of the girl yourself."

"That's just what I've made up my mind to do; but I wanted to see if Hudibras would get up a band to join mine, for I dare not take many away from the town when that scoundrel Addedomar is threatening to make a raid upon us."

"My son," said the woman anxiously, "what threatened raid do you speak of?"

"Did you not hear? Since the last time we gave that robber a drubbing at the Hot Swamp, he has taken to the woods and gathered together a large band of rascals like himself. We would not have minded that--for honest men are always numerous enough to keep villains in order--but two chiefs who have long been anxious to take possession of the land round the Swamp have agreed to join with him, so that they form a formidable body of warriors--too large to be treated with contempt."

"This is bad news, Gunrig. How does the king take it?"

"In his usual way. He does not believe in danger or mischief till it has overtaken him, and it is almost too late for action. There is one hope, however, that he will be induced to move in time. A young fellow has come from the far East, who was a great friend of that long-legged fellow Bladud, and he is bent on finding out where his friend has gone. Of course the king is willing to let him have as many men as he wants, though he sternly refuses to let Bladud return home; and I hope to induce this youth--Dromas, they call him--to join me, so that we may search together; for, of course, the search for the man may result in finding the girl. My only objection is that if we do find Bladud, I shall have to fight and kill him--unless the leprosy has happily killed him already. So, now, I will away and see what can be done about this hunt. My object in coming was to get my men, and to warn those left in charge of the town to keep a keen look-out for Addedomar, for he is a dangerous foe. Farewell, mother."

The woman was not addicted to the melting mood. She merely nodded as her son went out.

In pursuance of this plan, a band of about two hundred warriors was raised, armed, and provisioned for a long journey. Gunrig put himself at the head of a hundred and fifty of these, and Dromas, being a skilled warrior, was given command of the remaining fifty, with Captain Arkal, who begged to be allowed to go as his lieutenant, and little Maikar as one of his fighting men.

The orders were, that they should start off in the direction of the Hot Swamp, searching the country as they went, making diligent inquiries at the few villages they might pass, and questioning all travellers whom they might chance to meet with by the way. If Branwen should be found, she was to be sent back escorted by a detachment of a hundred men. If the retreat of Bladud should be discovered, news of the fact was to be sent to the king, and the prince was to be left there in peace with any of the men who might volunteer to live with him. But on no account were they or Bladud to return to Hudibras' town as long as there was the least danger of infection.

"Is he _never_ to return?" asked the queen, whimpering, when she heard these orders given.

"No, _never_!" answered the king in that awful tone which the poor queen knew too well meant something like a decree of Fate.

"Oh, father!" remonstrated Hafrydda--and Dromas loved her for the remonstrance--"not even if he is cured?"

"Well, of course, if he is cured, my child, that alters the case. But how am I to know that he is cured?--who is to judge? Our court doctor knows as much about it as a sucking pig--perhaps less!"

"Perhaps the Hebrew knows," suggested Hafrydda--and Dromas loved her for the suggestion!

"Ah, to be sure! I forgot the Hebrew. You may call at his hut in passing and take him with you, if he has come home yet. He's an amiable old man, and may consent to go. If not--make him. Away! and cease to worry me. That's the way to get rid of business, my queen; isn't it?"

"Certainly--it is one way," answered the queen, turning to the two commanders. "Go, and my blessing go with you!"

"Success attend you!" murmured the princess, glancing timidly at Dromas--and as Dromas gazed upon her fair face, and golden curls, and modest mien, he felt that he loved her for herself!

Success did not, however, attend them at first, for on reaching the Hebrew's hut they found it empty, and no amount of shouting availed to call Beniah from the "vasty deep" of the chasm, or the dark recesses of the secret chamber.

Pursuing their way, therefore, the small army was soon lost to view in the forest.


CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.


CROSS PURPOSES AND COMPLICATIONS.

We turn now to another scene in the wild-woods, not far distant from the Hot Swamp.

It is a thickly-wooded hollow on the eastern slopes of the high ridge that bounds one side of the valley of the Springs. Sturdy oaks, tall poplars, lordly elms and beeches, cast a deep shade over the spot which was rendered almost impenetrable by dense underwood. Even in brightest sunshine light entered it with difficulty, and in gloomy weather a sort of twilight constantly prevailed, while at night the place became the very abode of thick darkness.

In this retreat was assembled, one gloomy afternoon, a large body of armed men, not connected with the searching parties which had been ransacking the region in the vain duplex search which we have tried to describe. It was a war-party under the command of Addedomar the outlaw--if we may thus characterise a man in a land where there was little or no law of any kind, save that of might.

It was a strong band, numbering nearly four hundred warriors, all of whom were animated with the supposed-to-be noble desire to commit theft on a very large scale. It is true, they called it "conquest," which word in those days, as in modern times even among civilised people, meant killing many of the natives of a place and taking possession of their lands. Then--as now--this was sometimes styled "right of conquest," and many people thought then, as some think even now, that by putting this word "right" before "conquest" they made it all right! and had somehow succeeded in