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But they had not moved far in the direction of the hillock, before the men, with one consent, rose suddenly to their feet, and poured a flight of well-directed arrows on the shipwrecked company. "Back! back!" cried his lordship. "Beware, in Heaven's name, that ye reply not." "Nay," cried Greensheve, pulling an arrow from his leather jack.
"Let us back to land, good master," answered Greensheve. "We stand here too open; for, look ye, when the seas break heavy and white out there behind us, they shall see us plainly against the foam." "Ye speak sooth," returned Dick. "Ashore with us, right speedily." Thoroughly drenched and chilled, the two adventurers returned to their position in the gorse.
He had never thought of his sweetheart as of so superior a being, and he was instantly taken with a feeling of diffidence. But he had little opportunity for thought. A low "Hist!" sounded from close by, and he hastened to descend the ladder. "Who goes?" he whispered. "Greensheve," came the reply, in tones similarly guarded. "What want ye?" asked Dick.
"I pray Heaven that Capper make good speed!" said Dick. "I vow a candle to St. Mary of Shoreby if he come before the hour!" "Y' are in a hurry, Master Dick?" asked Greensheve. "Ay, good fellow," answered Dick; "for in that house lieth my lady, whom I love, and who should these be that lie about her secretly by night? Unfriends, for sure!"
"Now, John Capper," said Dick, "back with you to Shoreby, even as for your life. Bring me instantly what men ye can collect. Here shall be the rendezvous; or if the men be scattered and the day be near at hand before they muster, let the place be something farther back, and by the entering in of the town. Greensheve and I lie here to watch.
"I will do much for Master Shelton," returned the first; "but to come to the gallows for any man nay, brothers, not that!" The door of the inn opened, and another man entered hastily and approached the youth before the fire. "Master Shelton," he said, "Sir Daniel goeth forth with a pair of links and four archers." "Lawless," he said, "ye will take John Capper's watch. Greensheve, follow with me.
Who should these be?" "I do suspect the Lord of Shoreby," Dick replied. "When came they?" "They began to come, Master Dick," said Greensheve, "about the time ye crossed the wall. I had not lain there the space of a minute ere I marked the first of the knaves crawling round the corner."
Although the tide was still pretty far out, the surf was so high, and the sands so flat, that at each breaker a great sheet of froth and water came careering over the expanse, and Dick and Greensheve made this part of their inspection wading, now to the ankles, and now as deep as to the knees, in the salt and icy waters of the German Ocean.
"Well," returned Greensheve, "an John come speedily, we shall give a good account of them. They are not two score at the outside I judge so by the spacing of their sentries and, taken where they are, lying so widely, one score would scatter them like sparrows. And yet, Master Dick, an she be in Sir Daniel's power already, it will little hurt that she should change into another's.
Greensheve, Cuckow, and a young fellow of Lord Foxham's whom Dick had already remarked for his intelligence and spirit, were still, however, both fit to understand and willing to obey.
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