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CHAPTER X
A BRAVE RESCUE AND A ROUGH RIDE
It happened upon a November evening (when I was about
fifteen years old, and out-growing my strength very
rapidly, my sister Annie being turned thirteen, and a
deal of rain having fallen, and all the troughs in the
yard being flooded, and the bark from the wood-ricks
washed down the gutters, and even our water-shoot going
brown) that the ducks in the court made a terrible
quacking, instead of marching off to their pen, one
behind another. Thereupon Annie and I ran out to see
what might be the sense of it. There were thirteen
ducks, and ten lily-white (as the fashion then of ducks
was), not I mean twenty-three in all, but ten white and
three brown-striped ones; and without being nice about
their colour, they all quacked very movingly. They
pushed their gold-coloured bills here and there (yet
dirty, as gold is apt to be), and they jumped on the
triangles of their feet, and sounded out of their
nostrils; and some of the over-excited ones ran along
low on the ground, quacking grievously with their bills
snapping and bending, and the roof of their mouths
exhibited.
Annie began to cry 'Dilly, dilly, einy, einy, ducksey,'
according to the burden of a tune they seem to have
accepted as the national duck's anthem; but instead of
being soothed by it, they only quacked three times as
hard, and ran round till we were giddy. And then they
shook their tails together, and looked grave, and went
round and round again. Now I am uncommonly fond of
ducks, both roasted and roasting and roystering; and it
is a fine sight to behold them walk, poddling one after
other, with their toes out, like soldiers drilling, and
their little eyes cocked all ways at once, and the way
that they dib with their bills, and dabble, and throw
up their heads and enjoy something, and then tell the
others about it. Therefore I knew at once, by the way
they were carrying on, that there must be something or
other gone wholly amiss in the duck-world. Sister
Annie perceived it too, but with a greater quickness;
for she counted them like a good duck-wife, and could
only tell thirteen of them, when she knew there ought
to be fourteen.
And so we began to search about, and the ducks ran to
lead us aright, having come that far to fetch us; and
when we got down to the foot of the court-yard where
the two great ash-trees stand by the side of the little
water, we found good reason for the urgence and
melancholy of the duck-birds. Lo! the old white drake,
the father of all, a bird of high manners and chivalry,
always the last to help himself from the pan of
barley-meal, and the first to show fight to a dog or
cock intruding upon his family, this fine fellow, and
pillar of the state, was now in a sad predicament, yet
quacking very stoutly. For the brook, wherewith he had
been familiar from his callow childhood, and wherein he
was wont to quest for water-newts, and tadpoles, and
caddis-worms, and other game, this brook, which
afforded him very often scanty space to dabble in, and
sometimes starved the cresses, was now coming down in a
great brown flood, as if the banks never belonged to
it. The foaming of it, and the noise, and the cresting
of the corners, and the up and down, like a wave of the
sea, were enough to frighten any duck, though bred upon
stormy waters, which our ducks never had been.
There is always a hurdle six feet long and four and a
half in depth, swung by a chain at either end from an
oak laid across the channel. And the use of this
hurdle is to keep our kine at milking time from
straying away there drinking (for in truth they are
very dainty) and to fence strange cattle, or Farmer
Snowe's horses, from coming along the bed of the brook
unknown, to steal our substance. But now this hurdle,
which hung in the summer a foot above the trickle,
would have been dipped more than two feet deep but for
the power against it. For the torrent came down so
vehemently that the chains at full stretch were
creaking, and the hurdle buffeted almost flat, and
thatched (so to say) with the drift-stuff, was going
see-saw, with a sulky splash on the dirty red comb of
the waters. But saddest to see was between two bars,
where a fog was of rushes, and flood-wood, and
wild-celery haulm, and dead crowsfoot, who but our
venerable mallard jammed in by the joint of his
shoulder, speaking aloud as he rose and fell, with his
top-knot full of water, unable to comprehend it, with
his tail washed far away from him, but often compelled
to be silent, being ducked very harshly against his
will by the choking fall-to of the hurdle.
For a moment I could not help laughing, because, being
borne up high and dry by a tumult of the torrent, he
gave me a look from his one little eye (having lost one
in fight with the turkey-cock), a gaze of appealing
sorrow, and then a loud quack to second it. But the
quack came out of time, I suppose, for his throat got
filled with water, as the hurdle carried him back
again. And then there was scarcely the screw of his
tail to be seen until he swung up again, and left small
doubt by the way he sputtered, and failed to quack, and
hung down his poor crest, but what he must drown in
another minute, and frogs triumph over his body.
Annie was crying, and wringing her hands, and I was
about to rush into the water, although I liked not the
look of it, but hoped to hold on by the hurdle, when a
man on horseback came suddenly round the corner of the
great ash-hedge on the other side of the stream, and
his horse's feet were in the water.
'Ho, there,' he cried; 'get thee back, boy. The flood
will carry thee down like a straw. I will do it for
thee, and no trouble.'
With that he leaned forward, and spoke to his mare--she
was just of the tint of a strawberry, a young thing,
very beautiful--and she arched up her neck, as
misliking the job; yet, trusting him, would attempt it.
She entered the flood, with her dainty fore-legs
sloped further and further in front of her, and her
delicate ears pricked forward, and the size of her
great eyes increasing, but he kept her straight in the
turbid rush, by the pressure of his knee on her. Then
she looked back, and wondered at him, as the force of
the torrent grew stronger, but he bade her go on; and
on she went, and it foamed up over her shoulders; and
she tossed up her lip and scorned it, for now her
courage was waking. Then as the rush of it swept her
away, and she struck with her forefeet down the stream,
he leaned from his saddle in a manner which I never
could have thought possible, and caught up old Tom with
his left hand, and set him between his holsters, and
smiled at his faint quack of gratitude. In a moment
all these were carried downstream, and the rider lay
flat on his horse, and tossed the hurdle clear from
him, and made for the bend of smooth water.
They landed some thirty or forty yards lower, in the
midst of our kitchen-garden, where the winter-cabbage
was; but though Annie and I crept in through the hedge,
and were full of our thanks and admiring him, he would
answer us never a word, until he had spoken in full to
the mare, as if explaining the whole to her.
'Sweetheart, I know thou couldst have leaped it,' he
said, as he patted her cheek, being on the ground by
this time, and she was nudging up to him, with the
water pattering off her; 'but I had good reason, Winnie
dear, for making thee go through it.'
She answered him kindly with her soft eyes, and smiled
at him very lovingly, and they understood one another.
Then he took from his waistcoat two peppercorns, and
made the old drake swallow them, and tried him softly
upon his legs, where the leading gap in the hedge was.
Old Tom stood up quite bravely, and clapped his wings,
and shook off the wet from his tail-feathers; and then
away into the court-yard, and his family gathered
around him, and they all made a noise in their throats,
and stood up, and put their bills together, to thank
God for this great deliverance.
Having taken all this trouble, and watched the end of
that adventure, the gentleman turned round to us with a
pleasant smile on his face, as if he were lightly
amused with himself; and we came up and looked at him.
He was rather short, about John Fry's height, or may be
a little taller, but very strongly built and springy,
as his gait at every step showed plainly, although his
legs were bowed with much riding, and he looked as if
he lived on horseback. To a boy like me he seemed very
old, being over twenty, and well-found in beard; but he
was not more than four-and-twenty, fresh and ruddy
looking, with a short nose and keen blue eyes, and a
merry waggish jerk about him, as if the world were not
in earnest. Yet he had a sharp, stern way, like the
crack of a pistol, if anything misliked him; and we
knew (for children see such things) that it was safer
to tickle than buffet him.
'Well, young uns, what be gaping at?' He gave pretty
Annie a chuck on the chin, and took me all in without
winking.
'Your mare,' said I, standing stoutly up, being a tall
boy now; 'I never saw such a beauty, sir. Will you let
me have a ride of her?'
'Think thou couldst ride her, lad? She will have no
burden but mine. Thou couldst never ride her. Tut! I
would be loath to kill thee.'
'Ride her!' I cried with the bravest scorn, for she
looked so kind and gentle; 'there never was horse upon
Exmoor foaled, but I could tackle in half an hour.
Only I never ride upon saddle. Take them leathers off
of her.'
He looked at me with a dry little whistle, and thrust
his hands into his breeches-pockets, and so grinned
that I could not stand it. And Annie laid hold of me
in such a way that I was almost mad with her. And he
laughed, and approved her for doing so. And the worst
of all was--he said nothing.
'Get away, Annie, will you? Do you think I'm a fool,
good sir! Only trust me with her, and I will not
override her.'
'For that I will go bail, my son. She is liker to
override thee. But the ground is soft to fall upon,
after all this rain. Now come out into the yard, young
man, for the sake of your mother's cabbages. And the
mellow straw-bed will be softer for thee, since pride
must have its fall. I am thy mother's cousin, boy, and
am going up to house. Tom Faggus is my name, as
everybody knows; and this is my young mare, Winnie.'
What a fool I must have been not to know it at once!
Tom Faggus, the great highwayman, and his young
blood-mare, the strawberry! Already her fame was
noised abroad, nearly as much as her master's; and my
longing to ride her grew tenfold, but fear came at the
back of it. Not that I had the smallest fear of what
the mare could do to me, by fair play and
horse-trickery, but that the glory of sitting upon her
seemed to be too great for me; especially as there were
rumours abroad that she was not a mare after all, but a
witch. However, she looked like a filly all over, and
wonderfully beautiful, with her supple stride, and soft
slope of shoulder, and glossy coat beaded with water,
and prominent eyes full of docile fire. Whether this
came from her Eastern blood of the Arabs newly
imported, and whether the cream-colour, mixed with our
bay, led to that bright strawberry tint, is certainly
more than I can decide, being chiefly acquaint with
farm-horses. And these come of any colour and form;
you never can count what they will be, and are lucky to
get four legs to them.
Mr. Faggus gave his mare a wink, and she walked
demurely after him, a bright young thing, flowing over
with life, yet dropping her soul to a higher one, and
led by love to anything; as the manner is of females,
when they know what is the best for them. Then Winnie
trod lightly upon the straw, because it had soft muck
under it, and her delicate feet came back again.
'Up for it still, boy, be ye?' Tom Faggus stopped, and
the mare stopped there; and they looked at me
provokingly.
'Is she able to leap, sir? There is good take-off on
this side of the brook.'
Mr. Faggus laughed very quietly, turning round to
Winnie so that she might enter into it. And she, for
her part, seemed to know exactly where the fun lay.
'Good tumble-off, you mean, my boy. Well, there can be
small harm to thee. I am akin to thy family, and know
the substance of their skulls.'
'Let me get up,' said I, waxing wroth, for reasons I
cannot tell you, because they are too manifold; 'take
off your saddle-bag things. I will try not to squeeze
her ribs in, unless she plays nonsense with me.'
Then Mr. Faggus was up on his mettle, at this proud
speech of mine; and John Fry was running up all the
while, and Bill Dadds, and half a dozen. Tom Faggus
gave one glance around, and then dropped all regard for
me. The high repute of his mare was at stake, and what
was my life compared to it? Through my defiance, and
stupid ways, here was I in a duello, and my legs not
come to their strength yet, and my arms as limp as a
herring.
Something of this occurred to him even in his wrath
with me, for he spoke very softly to the filly, who now
could scarce subdue herself; but she drew in her
nostrils, and breathed to his breath and did all she
could to answer him.
'Not too hard, my dear,' he said: 'led him gently down
on the mixen. That will be quite enough.' Then he
turned the saddle off, and I was up in a moment. She
began at first so easily, and pricked her ears so
lovingly, and minced about as if pleased to find so
light a weight upon her, that I thought she knew I
could ride a little, and feared to show any capers.
'Gee wug, Polly!' cried I, for all the men were now
looking on, being then at the leaving-off time: 'Gee
wug, Polly, and show what thou be'est made of.' With
that I plugged my heels into her, and Billy Dadds flung
his hat up.
Nevertheless, she outraged not, though her eyes were
frightening Annie, and John Fry took a pick to keep him
safe; but she curbed to and fro with her strong
forearms rising like springs ingathered, waiting and
quivering grievously, and beginning to sweat about it.
Then her master gave a shrill clear whistle, when her
ears were bent towards him, and I felt her form beneath
me gathering up like whalebone, and her hind-legs
coming under her, and I knew that I was in for it.
First she reared upright in the air, and struck me full
on the nose with her comb, till I bled worse than Robin
Snell made me; and then down with her fore-feet deep in
the straw, and her hind-feet going to heaven. Finding
me stick to her still like wax, for my mettle was up as
hers was, away she flew with me swifter than ever I
went before, or since, I trow. She drove full-head at
the cobwall--'Oh, Jack, slip off,' screamed Annie--then
she turned like light, when I thought to crush her, and
ground my left knee against it. 'Mux me,' I cried, for
my breeches were broken, and short words went the
furthest--'if you kill me, you shall die with me.' Then
she took the court-yard gate at a leap, knocking my
words between my teeth, and then right over a quick set
hedge, as if the sky were a breath to her; and away for
the water-meadows, while I lay on her neck like a child
at the breast and wished I had never been born.
Straight away, all in the front of the wind, and
scattering clouds around her, all I knew of the speed
we made was the frightful flash of her shoulders, and
her mane like trees in a tempest. I felt the earth
under us rushing away, and the air left far behind us,
and my breath came and went, and I prayed to God, and
was sorry to be so late of it.
All the long swift while, without power of thought, I
clung to her crest and shoulders, and dug my nails into
her creases, and my toes into her flank-part, and was
proud of holding on so long, though sure of being
beaten. Then in her fury at feeling me still, she
rushed at another device for it, and leaped the wide
water-trough sideways across, to and fro, till no
breath was left in me. The hazel-boughs took me too
hard in the face, and the tall dog-briers got hold of
me, and the ache of my back was like crimping a fish;
till I longed to give up, thoroughly beaten, and lie
there and die in the cresses. But there came a shrill
whistle from up the home-hill, where the people had
hurried to watch us; and the mare stopped as if with a
bullet, then set off for home with the speed of a
swallow, and going as smoothly and silently. I never
had dreamed of such delicate motion, fluent, and
graceful, and ambient, soft as the breeze flitting over
the flowers, but swift as the summer lightning. I sat
up again, but my strength was all spent, and no time
left to recover it, and though she rose at our gate
like a bird, I tumbled off into the mixen.
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