Her voice led him to the door. He fitted the key into the lock and turned it, listening to the thunder of hooves drawing closer and ever closer.
The door was open, and Dominica sobbing on his breast.
“You are safe?” he asked urgently.
“Safe! safe!” she answered.
“God be praised!” He put her quickly aside and strode to the bed. The heavy quilt was flung off, the sheets snatched up and knotted. “The chase is hard upon me. I must let you down through your window, my bird.” He jerked at his knot. The horses were at hand, and trampling now as they were pulled up outside the lodge. Sir Nicholas reached the window, “Joshua?”
“Ready, master!” came the stealthy whisper.
He turned. “Come, fondling! Trust me to let you safely down.”
She let him lift her on to the window-ledge, but her hands clung to him. Downstairs blows were being rained on the shut door. “But you? But you?”
“Never fear,” he said. His voice was cool and reassuring. “Twist the sheet about your hands, so, and hold fast, child. Brave lass! Are you ready?”
Clinging tightly to her improvised rope she was lowered over the sill, hung dangling on the end of the sheet, and was let down into Joshua’s ready arms. He set her down, caught her hand, and led her away at the double across the garden to the hedge that shut it off from the forest.
“Hist, hist for your life!” he breathed. “Do as I bid you, mistress, and not a word out of you!”
Behind them the guards were in at the door of the lodge, stumbling over Don Diego’s body.
“Ah, he has been here, the villain!” cried Cruza. “He is here still! Search the house!”
Upstairs Beauvallet tore the key from the lock of Dominica’s door, and fitted it in again on the inside. He pulled the door to behind him just as Cruza came bounding up the stairs, a drawn sword in his hand.
“Well met, Señor Cruza!” said Beauvallet cheerfully, and held sword and dagger ready.
Cruza sent a shout echoing through the house. “To me! to me!”
The men came stamping up the stairs. “Why, what a pack of you!” said Sir Nicholas, amused.
“Yield you, señor!” Cruza cried. “You are outmatched!”
“Yield?” said Sir Nicholas. Up went his comical eyebrow. “God’s Son, Cruza, do you know who I am?”
“You are El Beauvallet, and I have sworn to take you! We are six to your one. Yield, yield!”
“You will be forsworn, good señor. I am El Beauvallet, so the odds are fair enough. Now who will take Nick Beauvallet?” He looked inquiringly, and wondered whether Joshua had got Dominica away yet.
“Insolent dog!” Cruza dashed in with levelled sword. “On to him, and take him alive!” he cried.
Sir Nicholas’ blade swept a circle before him. He laughed and shook the sweat from his eyes. “Alas, alas, for vain ambition! So-so! What, winded, my man?” A guard fell back with a slash across the forearm. Sir Nicholas beat down a big double-edged sword, and slipped his dagger-hand behind him, feeling for the handle of the door.
The Toledo blade bit shrewdly and sure indeed. Cruza staggered as the point went home in his shoulder, and recovered again. “Alive! I want him alive!” he gasped out.
Sir Nicholas’ fingers had found the door-handle, and turned it now in one quick movement. The door was flung open; he sprang back, fighting his way, sent the foremost guard sprawling with a wound in the breast, and slammed the door home behind him.
Cruza threw himself upon it, thrusting with all his might. “Quick, fools!” he cried, and heard the key grate in the lock. “Two of you down into the garden, under the window!” he jerked out. “Break down this door, you others! Break it down!”
Two of the guards went running down the stairs and round to the back; the rest set their shoulders to the door. The lock gave under the weight, the door flew wide, and the guards were in.
The room was empty. An overturned chair lay a-sprawl by the window; a casement swung open on its hinge, and the curtain beside it was rent from end to end.
With one accord his men followed Cruza to the window and tried to crane out. From the arras behind the door Sir Nicholas slipped out, kissed his fingers silently to the backs of the guards, and was off without a sound across the upper hall to the stairs.
He went down in a series of bounds, reached the hall, and stepped over Don Diego’s body to the door. A beam of light cast through the opening showed him a guard standing to the horses’ heads. He went forward in a rush then, and his sword-hilt took the guard on the chin almost before he was aware, and sent him sprawling in the road. Sir Nicholas caught a bridle, vaulted into the saddle, and stood up in his stirrups.
“Come then, ye dogs!” he cried. “Follow El Beauvallet if ye dare, and take Reck Not
for the word!” He wheeled about as the two guards came dashing round the corner of the house, and galloped off down the way by which he had come, eastwards towards the Frontier.
XXIV
The horse he had snatched was a fleet curtal bay, and responded readily enough to the clap of heels to his flanks. Sir Nicholas held him on his course with a hard hand, heard behind him shouts and the trampling of the horses he had cut loose by his sudden onslaught on the guard who held them, and pressed on. The noise died away, only the pounding of the bay’s hooves on the track now broke the stillness.
Where the track came out on the post-road a crowd was gathered, peering and listening. The news of the guards’ coming and the prey they sought had spread through the village; there were assembled now some peasants, agape, and servants of the Carvalho estate, fingering staves. Lanterns
