“Mr. Stillwell,” the earl said, a few days after his arrival at Castillon, “will you take twenty dragoons and ride out to the village of Estrella? The district round it is extremely hostile, and they prevent supplies being brought in from that direction. Get hold of the principal men in the place, and tell them that if I hear any more complaints of hostility in that neighborhood I will send out a regiment of horse, burn their village, and ravage all the country. I don't think you need apprehend any opposition; but of course you will keep a good lookout.” “Am I to return tonight, sir?”
“Let that depend upon your reception. If the inhabitants show a fairly good disposition, or if you see that at any rate there is a considerable section of the population well disposed to the cause, stay there for the night, and in the morning make a wide circuit through the district before returning. If you perceive a strong hostile feeling it were best not to sleep there; with so small a force you would be liable to a night attack.”
Twenty minutes later Jack rode off with his party, having first obtained directions from the natives as to the best road to Estrella. The village was but some fifteen miles off, and lay in the center of a fertile district on the other side of a range of lofty hills. The road they were traversing ran through the hills by a narrow and very steep valley.
“This would be a nasty place to be attacked,” Jack said to the sergeant, who was riding just behind him.
“It would, indeed, sir; and if they were to set some of those stones arolling they would soon knock our horses off their legs.”
A mile or two further on the road again descended and the valley opened to a fertile country. Another half hour's sharp riding brought them into Estrella. Their coming had probably been signaled, for the inhabitants evinced no sudden alarm as the little troop rode along the principal street. The women stood at the doors of the houses to look at them, the men were gathered in little knots at the corners; but all were unarmed, and Jack saw at once that there was no intention of offering resistance. He alighted at the door of the village inn, and in a few minutes two or three of the chief men in the village presented themselves.
“The English general,” Jack said, “has heard that the people of your neighborhood are hostile, and that those who would pass through with animals and stores for the army are prevented from doing so. He bids me say that he does not wish to war with the people of this country so long as they are peaceful. Those who take up arms he will meet with arms; but so long as they interfere not with him he makes no inquiry as to whether their wishes are for King Charles or Philip of Anjou; but if they evince an active hostility he will be forced to punish them. You know how Marshal Tesse has massacred unarmed citizens whom he deemed hostile, and none could blame the English general did he carry out reprisals; but it will grieve him to have to do so. He has therefore sent me with this small troop to warn you that if the people of this village and district interfere in any way with his friends, or evince signs of active hostility, he will send a regiment of horse with orders to burn the village to the ground, and to lay all the district bare.”
“Your general has been misinformed,” the principal man in the place said. “There are, it is true, some in the district who hold for Philip of Anjou; but the population are well disposed to King Charles, and this village is ready to furnish any supplies that the English may require. If your honor will give me a list of these I will do my best to have them in readiness by tomorrow morning, and I trust that you will honor us by stopping here till then.”
Jack hesitated; he did not much like the appearance of the man or the tone of humility in which he spoke; still, as he offered to furnish supplies, he thought it well to accept the same.
“What horses could you let us have?” he asked.
“We could supply ten horses,” the man said, “fit for cavalry, four wagons of grain, and twenty barrels of wine.”
“Very well,” Jack said; “if these are ready by tomorrow morning I will accept them as an earnest of your goodwill, and now I require food for my men.”
“That shall be ready for them in an hour,” the man replied.
Jack now gave orders to the sergeant that the girths to the saddles should be loosened, and the horses fastened in readiness for service in the street close to the inn. Four men were then posted as pickets at the distance of a quarter of a mile on each side of the village. Corn was brought for the horses. The women and children gathered round to gaze at the foreign soldiers, and Jack was convinced that there was at any rate no intention to effect a surprise while he remained in the village. In an hour the dinner was served, and there was no reason to complain of the quantity or quality of the provisions.
An hour after dinner the troop again mounted and took a detour of some miles through the district, passing through several other villages, in none of which were the slightest signs of hostility met with.
“Sergeant,” Jack said, after they had returned to Estrella, “everything looks very quiet and peaceful; but, considering what we have heard of the feeling in this district, it seems to me that it is almost too peaceful. I can't help feeling somewhat uneasy. When it gets dark divide the troop into two parties; keep one constantly under arms; place sentries in pairs at each end of the village, and keep a most vigilant watch. Do not let the others scatter to the quarters the mayor has provided; but let all lie down here in the inn ready to turn out at a moment's notice. They are a treacherous lot, these Spaniards, and we cannot be too strictly on our guard.”
The night passed, however, without an incident, and in the morning, the five wagons with grain and wine, and eight horses, were brought in.
Jack, rather ashamed of his suspicions on the previous night, thanked the mayor warmly. Eight of the troopers took each a led horse. The four countrymen in charge of the wagons shouted to their oxen, and the party moved out from Estrella.
“There are very few men about the village, Mr. Stilwell,” the sergeant said, as Jack reined back his horse to speak to him. “Did you notice that, sir?”
“Yes,” Jack said; “I did notice it; for except a few old men and boys, there were none but women and children gathered round or standing at their door. There were plenty of men about yesterday; but perhaps they have all gone up to work in the fields; however, we will keep our eyes open. You had best ride forward, sergeant, to the two men in front and tell them to keep a sharp lookout.”
They were proceeding only at a slow walk in order to keep pace with the wagons, and it was an hour and a half after leaving Estrella before they entered the hills.
Jack noticed that although many women and girls could be seen working in the fields, not a man was in sight.
“It is curious, sergeant, that there are no men about, and I can't help thinking that all is not right. Do you take four men with you and ride straight on through that nasty narrow valley we noticed as we came. Keep a sharp lookout on both sides, for there are rocks enough on those hills to hide an army.”
Jack halted the detachment when the scouting party went forward. In three quarters of an hour the sergeant returned with his men, saying that he had ridden right through the valley and could see no signs of life whatever.
“Very well, sergeant, then we will proceed. But we will do so in groups. If we are to be attacked in that valley, we could make no fight of it were we ten times as many as we are; and if we must be caught, they shall have as few of us as possible; therefore, let a corporal with four men go on a good quarter of a mile ahead, so that he will be past the worst part before the next body enter. Then do you take ten men and go next. I will follow you at the same distance with the other five men and the wagons. Order the corporal if attacked to ride through if possible; if not, to fall back to you. Do you do the same. If you are nearly through the valley when you are attacked, dash straight forward. I shall see what is going on, and will turn and ride back with my party, and making a sweep round through the flat country find my way back by some other road. In that case by no possibility can they get more than a few of us.”
These orders, which were well calculated to puzzle a concealed enemy, were carried out. The corporal's party were just disappearing round a turn at the upper end of the valley when the main body under the sergeant entered it. Jack was not quite so far behind, and halted as he entered the valley to allow those who preceded him to get through before he proceeded. They were still some two hundred yards from the further end when a shot was heard, and in an instant men appeared from behind every rock, and the hillside was obscured with smoke as upward of two hundred guns were fired almost simultaneously. Then there was a deep rumbling noise, and the rocks came bounding down from above.
The sergeant carried out Jack's orders. At the flash of the first gun he set off with his men at a gallop; and so quick and sudden was the movement that but few of the bullets touched them, and the rocks for the most part thundered down in their rear. Two or three horses and men were, however, struck down and crushed by the massive rocks; but the rest of the party got through the pass in safety and joined their comrades who had preceded them. They rode on for a short distance further, and then there was a halt, and wounds were examined and bandaged.
“It is well that we came as we did,” the sergeant said to his corporal; “if we had been all together, with the wagons blocking up the road, not a man Jack of us would have escaped alive. What an escape it has been! the whole hillside seemed coming down on us.”
“What will Mr. Stilwell do, sergeant?”
“He said he should ride back into the plain and take some other way round,” the sergeant replied; “but I fear he won't find it so easy. Fellows who would lay such an ambush as that are pretty sure to have taken steps to cut off the retreat of any who might escape and ride back. I am sure I hope he will get out of it, for he is a good officer, and as pleasant a young fellow as one can want to serve under; besides, there are five of our chaps with him.”
Jack had halted his men the instant the first shot was fired. “Shall I shoot these fellows, sir?” one of the troopers asked, drawing his pistol and pointing it at the head of one of the peasants leading a yoke of oxen.
“No,” Jack said; “they are unarmed; besides, they are plucky fellows for risking their lives on such a venture. There! the sergeant's troop have got through; but there are two or three of them down. Come along, lads, we must ride back, and there is no time to lose. Keep well together, and in readiness to charge if I give the word. It is likely enough our turn may come next.”
They rode on without interruption at full gallop till they neared the lower end of the valley. Then Jack drew up his horse. Across the road and the ground on each side extended a dozen carts, the oxen being taken out, and the carts placed end to end so as to form a barricade. A number of men were standing behind them.
“I expected something of this sort,” muttered Jack. He looked at the hills on either side, but they were too steep to ride up on horseback; and as to abandoning the animals and taking to the hills on foot, it was not to be thought of, for the active peasants would easily overtake them.
“We must ride straight forward,” he said; “there is no other way out of it. There is level ground enough for a horse to pass round the left of the wagons. Ride for that point as hard as you can, and when you are through keep straight forward for a quarter of a mile till we are together again. Now!”
Giving his horse the spur, Jack dashed off at full speed, followed closely by the troopers. As they approached the line guns flashed out from the wagons, and the bullets sang thickly round them; but they were going too fast to be an easy mark, and the peasants, after firing their guns, seeing the point for which they were making, ran in a body to oppose them, armed with pitch forks and ox goads; few of them had, however, reached the spot when Jack and his troopers dashed up. There was a short sharp struggle, and then, leaving five or six of the peasants dead on the ground, the troopers burst through and rode forward. One man only had been lost in the passage, shot through the head as he approached the gap.
“So far we are safe,” Jack said, “and as I expect every man in the country round was engaged in that ambush, we need not hurry for the present. The question is, Which way to go?”
This was indeed a difficult point to settle, for Jack was wholly ignorant of the country. He had made inquiries as to the way to Estrella, but knew nothing of any other roads leading from that village, and indeed, for aught he knew, the road by which he had come might be the only one leading to the south through the range of hills.
“We will turn west,” he said, after a moment's thought, “and keep along near the foot of the hills till we come to another road crossing them.”
So saying, he set forward at an easy trot across the fields of maize and wheat stubble, vineyards, and occasionally orchards. For upward of two hours Jack led the way, but they saw no signs of a road, and he observed with uneasiness that the plain was narrowing fast and the hills on the left trending to meet those on the right and form an apparently unbroken line ahead.
The horses were showing signs of fatigue, and Jack drew rein on somewhat rising ground and looked anxiously round. If, as it seemed, there was no break in the bills ahead, it would be necessary to retrace their steps, and long ere this the defenders of the ravine would have returned to their homes, and learned from the men a............