CHAPTER II

CAPTAIN OF DENT

Little Dick Chester had never known a mother's love nor a father's care. His mother died when he was born. His father had been too much occupied with the King's business to attend to his family. Dick had been alternately petted and tyrannized over by servants. He was high-spirited, but had never been taught to control himself, and his want of training amongst gentle people had left him something of a savage. His cousin John had beaten him for his insolence, as he called it; and the rector of the parish had set him tasks to learn for his carelessness; but he had never had an example to go by. He feared his cousin, and hated learning in the person of the rector. He was proud--proud of his good birth, of his old castle, of his new title,--inclined to be overbearing, and, if roughly used, revengeful.

Struggling out of the moat water, he dashed open the gate-house door, and with a torrent of angry words, dripping, gasping, choking, flung his small person into the room.

"Upon my word!" said Giles the stableman. He was sitting at the table writing.

"What do you mean? How do you dare?" Dick cried, tossing the drops from his hair. "Writing! Since when did beggars learn to spell?" He swept ink, pens, and paper off the table on to the floor.

"Since young gentlemen ceased to learn manners," said Giles, and he frowned.

"Pooh!" said Dick rudely, stamping on the fallen papers. "Go to, for a surly rogue and pretender. You cannot write your own name nor what you are--beggar."

"I could write your name and what you are, nathless," said Giles, picking up his writing from the floor.

Dick clutched at the paper to tear it away. "Fair and softly," said Giles, holding it far above his head. "Go and fetch your coat and shoes, your honour, and then we'll have a talk."

He let down the bridge. Dick shook his head. "When I'm across you'll pull it up again and leave me."

For answer Giles snapped his fingers, walked out across the bridge, picked up the coat and shoes, and came back. The bridge was pulled up, the portcullis lowered, and Giles came in to find Dick reading the superscription of the letter which he had taken from the floor.

"'To His Majesty the King!'" He laughed at Giles. "You write to the King, Giles!" and he laughed again.

"Sir," said Giles, "I was never thrashed for reading another man's letter, but I have the best will in the world to thrash you for it now. However, I'd do it did I not know you were ignorant of politeness, never having been taught it. Let it pass."

Dick blushed, but said angrily: "You! Who are you? The stable-help?"

Giles bowed.

"Picked up by Captain Dent, who knows where, or how, three days ago."

"True," said Giles. "On the great North Road, sitting in the ditch, starving. 'Want a job, my man?' said the captain. 'Want some food, my lord,' said I meekly. 'Hold my horse,' growled the captain, and went into an inn. At the end of half an hour he came out of the inn and asked me one or two questions. 'On what side was I?' 'On the road-side,' I answered. 'Did I want an easy job and much money?' 'Of course I did.' Followed a good meal at The Checkers, in the presence of two ugly Puritans, and then the captain's stirrup and a long trot hither."

Dick listened with interest, half-forgetting his anger.

"Why did you lie in the ditch starving, Giles?" he demanded.

"Because," said Giles gravely, "had I lain in the middle of the road I should have been, by your leave, trodden on. And now, sir," he added, "let me tell you I am for the King, and I happen to know it was the King's will that this house should be held for him."

"Yes," Dick cried, "word was sent us with the express order to keep the flag flying and hold out till relieved. Then comes news of my father's death, and Master Purvis was frightened. Then comes my cousin, Captain Dent, saying we must all quit, and he brings--"

"Me," said Giles, "and he bids me shut up the house closely when he has gone, and surrender to the first Roundhead who knocks at the gate. Captain John Dent is a traitor."

Dick started to his feet.

"Giles," he cried, "what shall we do?"

"When I saw you," said Giles, shaking his finger at him, "running away this morning, I thought you too were a traitor. I would have stood by the old place, and--"

"Giles! I only ran away from my cousin. I'm here. I've come back. I hid so's to return."

"Very good," said Giles. "Then we two will hang on here, and fly our old rag over the crop-ears of Puritans."

Dick did not think to question the loyalty and devotion of the stableman. His plan was his plan; his intention jumped with his own. He had only been in the place a week; he was a stranger, a beggar a tramp from the road, a starving man out of a ditch, but there was something so gay, so fearless about him that young Dick was attracted.

"For God and the King!" cried Giles, tossing his battered hat.

"For God and the King!" Dick echoed proudly, and they shook hands.

"We're well victualled, sir," said Giles, "and our walls will stand anything but cannon. You must know I heard a thing or two at The Checkers that led me to suppose the enemy may be here any moment."

Dick gave a caper of delight. Fancy the glory! A castle to hold alone--almost alone! Sir Richard Chester, aged eleven, supported only by a stable-helper, held his castle for the King for--oh, weeks!--with incredible risks! Dick almost regretted the great stores of flour, of beer, of hams and cured pork, of preserves and wines at his command. He was almost ashamed of the thickness of his walls, for he was in comparative safety, and might dwell at his ease and laugh at his foes he thought.

"Giles," he said.

"Sir," said Giles, pulling his forelock.

"I am the captain of this castle."

"Not a doubt of it, sir."

Dick smiled, and walked, head in air, across the floor. Giles watched him.

"If your honour will go and change your clothes, which are too wet to be healthy, I will prepare dinner," he said respectfully.

A clammy, clinging feeling about the legs and back moved Dick to acquiescence. He ran out, first being graciously pleased to remark that he was hungry.

Giles followed him thoughtfully across the court and into the kitchen. During dinner, which Dick insisted upon Giles sharing with him, he explained that he had decided that Giles must be promoted from the stables to be his lieutenant, especially as there were no horses in the stables to mind. Giles thanked him with becoming gratitude. Then Dick held forth upon the grand position they were in, the solemnity of their trust, and the wicked desertion of Captain John Dent.

"He said he had no orders to hold the place," Dick said, "and we couldn't without him. His orders were to rejoin his regiment. He frightened the men-servants with something or other, and they ran away. No one cared but me."

"What did he mean to do with you, I wonder?" said Giles.

"Take me with him and put me to school, he said," and Dick shrugged his shoulders. Defending a castle is better than school, and an enemy not yet arrived is pleasanter in contemplation than a cousin's harsh words and heavy whip.

"Is the flag up, Giles?" he questioned restlessly. And, seeing that it was, he set off to visit the walls and defences, as he said. Later in the afternoon he came out on the leads by the flagstaff, and found Giles there looking out over the land. Giles was a tall young man, but he stooped somewhat. His dark hair was not cropped like the Puritans', nor long and waving like the Cavaliers'. It fell over his brow and straggled over his shoulders untidily. He wore a long beard and moustache, and his skin was tanned and browned by sun and wind. He was thin, but seemed stronger and more active than he looked. His clothes were an indescribable tangle of rags. Yet, withal, he looked clean, and Dick remembered seeing him undergoing very prolonged morning ablutions at the pump in the yard. His eyes were particularly nice, large and rather sad, but very friendly and kind.

Dick sat down by him on the leads. He was tired, and a little disappointed that the enemy had not arrived yet and given him an opportunity for importance.

"Giles," he said, "have you always been a groom?"

"No, sir," said Giles, smiling.

"What have you been?"

"Everything, I fancy, except a thief; and then, again, nothing, except a fool."

Dick was puzzled.

"What were you doing on the road when Cousin John picked you up? Where had you been?"

"I had just come from France," said Giles.

Dick stared.

"Well--" he said.

"I was in France, and my master sent for me to come to England."

"I see. Your master was in England?"

"Ay. So I took ship and came over. I was ill at the time, but that was no matter. When we landed we stayed the night at an inn--an infamous place. The landlord would have murdered me. The servant who was with me ran away--custom of servants, you will observe,--the landlord seized my baggage. His wife helped me to escape in these rags of her husband's. I took, perforce, to the road, for I was penniless and a stranger, and your cousin found me. And," he turned himself round with a comical movement of his hands towards his tattered person, "behold me!" he said.

Dick laughed.

"And your master, Giles; where is he?"

"Ah, boy! where is every man's master in these days? He is riding up and down England, fighting and flying."

"A soldier?" Dick asked.

"Be sure of it," Giles answered. "We shall meet soon, doubtless." Then he laughed. "Faith, he wouldn't know me if we met to-day," he said.

"Have you been in other countries besides France?" Dick questioned.

"Ay. Germany, the Low Countries, and Spain, and Russia, and Italy."

"With your master?"

"I have served many masters," said Giles shortly.

Silence fell. Then Dick suddenly sprang up.

"Look!" he cried, "look!" He pointed to a cloud of dust on the highroad. "They come!" he said.