From that day forward, the first strangeness of their gipsy life grew to be familiar, usual. Little by little the Parliament soldiery went south or westward¹, to share in the attack on Royalist garrisons² still unaffected by the disastrous³ news from Yorkshire; but the country was infested⁴ by roving bands of cut-purses and murderers—men who had hung on the skirts of civil war, ready to be King's men or Levellers, when they knew which side claimed the victory.
 
It was the exploits of these prowling rascals⁵ that set many a story going of the outrages⁶ committed by true Roundheads, who had no share in them; but the Squire⁷ of Nappa was not concerned with public rumour⁸ or the judgment⁹ of generations to come after. His whole heart—all the untiring watchfulness¹⁰ that had made him a leader of picked cavalry—were centred in this new, appalling¹¹ peril¹². Day by day the raff and jetsom of the country moved abroad in numbers that steadily¹³ increased. They were not dangerous in the open against the disciplined men of Knaresborough and Nappa; but they asked for constant vigilance, as if the wolf-packs of old days had returned to haunt these moorland solitudes¹⁵.
 
They were heading by short stages to Nappa; for, as the Squire explained, there was room enough in house and outbuildings to house them all, and they might well hold it for the King, if the chance of war brought the tumult¹⁶ North again.
 
"A hard-bitten bull-dog, you," said the Governor of Knaresborough.
 
"Ay, maybe. I guard my own, and there's a sort of bite about a Mecca when he's roused."
 
"There is, sir—a Yorkshire bite, they say."
 
Their route was hindered, not only by prowling vagabonds, but by the men who fell sick by the wayside, now that the stress of the big fight was ended, and they had leisure to take count of wounds. Miss Bingham went among the fallen, bandaging a wound here, giving a cup of water there, bringing constantly the gift she had of soothing¹⁷ sick men's fancies.
 
Once—it was when they camped on Outlaw¹⁸ Moss¹⁹, and the gloaming found her nursing little Blake—the Governor and Squire Metcalf halted as they made their round of the camp.
 
"So Blake has given in at last," said the Squire. "Pity he didn't learn that lesson years ago."
 
"That is true, sir," said Miss Bingham gravely. "With a broken heart, there's no shame in lying down by the wayside. He should have done it long since."
 
The Governor laughed, as if a child's fancy had intruded²⁰ into the workaday routine. "The jest will serve, Miss Bingham. We know Blake, and, believe me, he never had a heart to be broken. Whipcord and sinew—he rides till he drops, with no woman's mawkishness²¹ to hinder him."
 
"No mawkishness," she agreed. "I give you good-night, gentlemen. He needs me, if he is not to die before the dawn."
 
"Oh, again your pardon," said the Governor roughly. "You played in Knaresborough—you were always playing—and we thought you light."
 
"So I am, believe me, when men are able to take care of themselves. It is when they're weak that I grow foolish and a nurse."
 
Metcalf and the Governor were silent as they went their round, until the Squire turned abruptly²².
 
"My wife is like that," he said, as if he had captured some new truth, unguessed by the rest of a dull world. "Ay, and my mother, God rest her. Memories of cradle-days return, when we are weak; they show their angel side."
 
"There's only one thing ails²³ Miss Bingham—she's a woman to the core of her. Eh, Metcalf, it must be troublesome to be a woman. I'd liefer take all my sins pick-a-back, and grumble²⁴ forward under the weight, and be free of whimsies²⁵."
 
Through the short summer's night, Miss Bingham tended Blake. She heard him talk of Knaresborough and the ferry-steps—always the ferry-steps. She learned all that she had seemed to him, and wondered how any man could view any woman through such a pleasant mist of worship. Then she listened to the tale of his rude awakening²⁶, and winced²⁷ as he spoke²⁸ in delirium²⁹ words that could never be forgotten. And then again they were watching Nidd River swirl³⁰ beneath them, and he was busy with a lover's promises. When he slept at last, wearied by the speed of his own fancies, she sat watching him. A round, white moon had climbed over the edge of Outlaw Moss. She saw the lines of hardship in his face—lines bitten in by harsh weather of the world and of the soul.
 
"Poor Blake," she thought, "ah, poor li'le Blake!"
 
From the foolery that had been her life till now there came a gust³¹ of sickliness. Blake could not live till dawn. She would go afield while they were hiding him under the earth, would bring wild flowers and strew³² them broadcast over his resting-place. She would pray tenderly at his graveside.
 
Already she half believed these pious³³ exercises would recompense Blake for the loss of all he had cared for in this life. He would know that she was there, and look down on the fret³⁴ and burden of his heartbreak as a thing well worth the while. She would smother³⁵ his dead grief with flowers and penitence³⁶.
 
It was Blake himself who disordered the well-planned poetry. He did not die at dawn. They waited three days on Outlaw Moss till they knew that he would live, and four days afterwards until his old laugh returned, and he could get his knees about a saddle. Then they went forward another stage on the slow journey out to Nappa.
 
Miss Bingham stood between the old world and the new; and that experience, for any man or woman's soul, is hazardous³⁷. She saw herself in true outline. As others gambled with gold and silver pieces, she had played with hearts. She had not known the value of the stakes; but now she understood. One by one, in memory's cold procession, she saw them pass—Blake, his young soul on fire with worship; Anstruther, who had persisted in throning her among the stars, and who was now, they said, no company for any gentry³⁸ save those of wayside taverns³⁹. She hid her eyes. Spoiled, wayward, she resented the discipline of penance⁴¹. Day by day she thought more of Christopher, and welcomed his sturdy self-reliance as a shield against her past.
 
Day by day, too, Joan Grant grew more silent, more aloof⁴² from the haphazard⁴³ routine of their life among the hills. And the whole camp looked on, afraid for their idol⁴⁴, Christopher, afraid for Joan, great loathing⁴⁵ for Miss Bingham growing in their midst.
 
Miss Bingham, well aware of the hostility⁴⁶, did not know whether her heart were hardened or softened⁴⁷ by it. It was as if she stood in the thick of a northern March—sunshine on one side of the hedge, sleet⁴⁸ and a bitter wind on the other. But there came a day when she carried her troubles to a little, ferny glen hidden deep among the pastures and the heather. Their morning's route had brought them near to Hawes, the grey village that gathers the spreading Yorkshire dales into its hand as a lady holds an open fan. The camp was busy, dining on odds⁴⁹ and ends—mutton, cabbage, herbs, all stewing⁵⁰ fragrantly⁵¹ in a pot reared gipsy-wise over a fire of wood—and Miss Bingham heard their laughter come up the breeze.
 
They had purchased a barrel of home-brewed ale from a neighbouring tavern⁴⁰, and were toasting Blake at the moment.
 
"Here's to li'le Blake, who never tires," said the Squire.
 
"Why should he?" put in Michael. "Women have never troubled him, I wager⁵²."
 
"At your age, youngster, to go flouting⁵³ the good sex!" growled⁵⁴ the Governor.
 
"Your pardon, sir. The sex has flouted⁵⁵ me. I'm envying Blake because he had mother-wit to steer⁵⁶ wide of trouble. Even Elizabeth, who dotes on me, is full of the most devilish caprices."
 
Kit⁵⁷ grew impatient of it all. He was in no mood for the banter⁵⁸ and light jests that eased the journey home to Nappa. There was a fever in his blood, a restlessness whose cause was known to every man in camp except himself. He sought some hiding-place, with the instinct of all wounded folk; and his glance fell on a wooded gorge⁵⁹ that showed as a sanctuary⁶⁰ set in the middle of a treeless land.
 
He came down the path between the honeysuckle and the flowering thorns. There was a splash of water down below, and he had in mind to bathe in some sequestered⁶¹ pool and wash away the heat and trouble of the times.
 
He found the pool, green with reflected leafage, deep and murmurous⁶², and saw Miss Bingham seated at its brink⁶³. She turned with a smile of welcome.
 
"I knew that you would come, my Puritan. There is room beside me here. Sit and tell me—all that the waterfall is singing—the might-have-beens, the fret and bubble of this life—the never-ending wonder that men should die for their King when there are easier roads to follow."
 
"Ask the stream." Kit's laugh was unsteady, and his voice seemed to come from far-away. "To die for the King—it may not be ease, but surely it is happiness."
 
"Talk to me. Tell me how he looked—the King—when you saw him there in Oxford⁶⁴. And Rupert? His name alone brings back the old Crusading days, before we grew tired of poetry."
 
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