One morning a splendid red stag dashed through the thicket directly in front of his face; its flanks were heaving, its eyes staring wildly, there was blood on its lips, and it swayed as it bounded, for the creature was nearly spent.
The stag paused an instant as though grown stupid, then off it went to the left; but the hounds did not follow, the forest was silent.
“They have lost the scent,” thought Gian-Luca.
But presently he saw a couple of horsemen pressing forward through the trees.
“Seen him?” they asked quickly, observing Gian-Luca; and they urged on their beasts, leaning sideways as they did so, the better to hear his reply.
Then Gian-Luca lied, pointing in the wrong direction. “He went off there to the right,” he told them; “he was travelling pretty fast, too, when I saw him.”
“Oh, he’s game all right!” remarked one of the riders as they swung round and galloped away.
XII
I
It was early in September when they caught the roan pony, and they caught him as he stood beside Gian-Luca. A farmer and his boy came quietly forward, and the man slipped a halter on to the pony. The beast looked surprised, but not really resentful, because he now trusted men.
The farmer nodded, grinning at Gian-Luca. “Strong little devil,” he remarked, “got plenty of work in him, look at his loin; no trouble with him either, it seems.”
Gian-Luca’s heart gave a bound of fear. “You are taking him away?” he faltered.
“Yes,” said the farmer, “his turn’s about come; we’ve all got to work for our living.”
The pony began to pull back on the halter, edging towards Gian-Luca.
“Come up!” ordered the boy.
“Steady now!” coaxed the farmer, patting the pony’s neck.
Gian-Luca said: “Where are you going to take him?”
“I’ve sold him,” the man replied; and he eyed this scarecrow of a tramp with interest. “Are you keen on horses?” he inquired.
“Yes, but where will he go to?” Gian-Luca persisted, laying his hand on the pony.
“To the mines,” said the farmer; “they most of ’em go there, that is, when they’re small enough.”
For a moment Gian-Luca stood as though turned to stone, then he threw up his arms with a cry. “No, no!” he babbled; “not the mines. Oh! for God’s sake—he will never see the light in the mines—he will go blind! I cannot let him be taken to the mines, the creature has been my friend.” He spread out his hands and pointed to the trees. “Look, look!” he went on wildly; “all this beauty and freedom, all this greenness and joy—the mines, they are dark, all his life in the darkness—his body full of sores from straining at the trucks, his eyes filming over for want of the sunshine, his heart breaking because he has known the forest, because he remembers and remembers—” And now he was clutching at the farmer’s arm. “Listen! per amore di Dio, but listen! I will buy him, I tell you I will buy the beast’s freedom, only tell me how much and I will buy him!”
“You!” growled the farmer, pushing him off, and staring skeptically at him; then his eyes grew more kind: “Poor devil, you look starving—what’s the matter, you’re lightheaded, can’t you find work, or what?” His hand went quickly down to his pocket: “Here, take this,” he muttered, producing some silver; “take this and buy yourself a square meal.” And he handed Gian-Luca three shillings.
Quite firmly but gently he thrust out his arm between Gian-Luca and the pony. He gave the rope of the halter to the boy. “Get on with it!” he ordered. “Come along, now, look sharp!”
And the pony went with them, giving no trouble, because he had learnt to trust men.
Gian-Luca threw himself down on the ground, burying his face in his hands, and he spoke to the earth, asking it to show pity.
“Let him die, let him die, let him die!” he entreated, as though the earth had ears wherewith to hear, as though it were a mother who must surely feel compassion for the creatures her bounty had nourished.
Then he told the earth, in low, broken words, of the life of the ponies in the mines; all that he knew of that life he told it, and all that his half-distraught mind must picture.
“He trusted them because of me,” moaned Gian-Luca; “I gave him his faith, and yet I cannot save him—he is little but he has a heart full of courage—he will work until that heart breaks!”
He stopped speaking as though he were waiting for an answer, then a most peculiar thing happened; Gian-Luca heard a voice inside his own head, quite loudly it spoke, with a kind of precision.
“Merripen,” said the voice, “death is life, Gian-Luca—it is only for such a little while.”
Gian-Luca sat up and pressed his fingers to his temples. “I must be going mad,” he muttered.
II
The forest was turning scarlet and golden, touched by the first sudden frosts of autumn, and Gian-Luca felt terribly cold these nights, so that sometimes he must get up and walk. The fever had left him, its place being taken by an ever-increasing weakness, yet the thought of four walls that would shut him in, the thought of a roof that would shut away the sky, and above all the thought of leaving the trees, filled him with misery.
“If I eat more I may feel less cold,” he reasoned; so whenever he felt able he went into Lyndhurst, and while there he would try to pull himself together, smiling as he purchased his food. “If they think I am ill they will catch me!” he would mutter; “and of course I am not really ill—”
But when he had tramped slowly back to the forest, he would find that he could eat very little after all; his stomach had grown unaccustomed to
