第79章

Night - Horses tramping

The village of Weatherbury was quiet as the graveyard in its midst, and the living were lying well nigh as still as the dead. The church clock struck eleven. The air was so empty of other sounds that the whirr of the clock-work immediately before the strokes was distinct, and so was also the click of the same at their close. The notes flew forth with the usual blind obtuseness of inanimate things - flapping and rebounding among walls, undulating against the scattered clouds, spreading through their interstices into unexplored miles of space.

Bathsheba's crannied and mouldy halls were to-night occupied only by Maryann, Liddy being, as was stated, with her sister, whom Bathsheba had set out to visit. A few minutes after eleven had struck, Maryann turned in her bed with a sense of being disturbed. She was totally unconscious of the nature of the interruption to her sleep. It led to a dream, and the dream to an awakening, with an uneasy sensation that something had happened. She left her bed and liked out of the window. The paddock abutted on this end of the building, and in the paddock she could just discern by the uncertain gray a moving figure approaching the horse that was feeding there. The figure seized the horse by the forelock, and led it to the comer of the field. Here she could see some object which circumstances proved to be a vehicle, for after a few minutes spent apparently in harnessing, she heard the trot of the horse down the road, mingled with the sound of light wheels.

Two varieties only of humanity could have entered the paddock with the ghost-like glide of that mysterious figure. They were a woman and a gipsy man. A woman was out of the question in such an occupation at this hour, and the comer could be no less than a thief, who might probably have known the weakness of the household on this particular night, and have chosen it on that account for his daring attempt. Moreover, to raise suspicion to conviction itself, there were gipsies in Weatherbury Bottom.

Maryann, who had been afraid to shout in the robber's presence, having seen him depart had no fear. She hastily slipped on her clothes, stumped down the disjointed staircase with its hundred creaks, ran to Coggan's, the nearest house, and raised an alarm. Coggan called Gabriel, who now again lodged in his house as at first, and together they went to the paddock.

Beyond all doubt the horse was gone.

`Hark!' said Gabriel.

They listened. Distinct upon the stagnant air came the sounds of a trotting horse passing up Longpuddle Lane - just blond the gipsies' encampment in Weatherbury Bottom.

`That's our Dainty - I'll swear to her step,' said Jan.

`Mighty me! Won't mis'ess storm and call us stupids when she comes back!' moaned Maryann. `How I wish it had happened when she was at home, and none of us had been answerable!'

`We must ride after,' said Gabriel decisively. `I'll be responsible to Miss Evendene for what we do. Yes, we'll follow.'

`Faith, I don't see how,' said Coggan. `All our hors's are too heavy for that trick except little Poppet, and what's she between two of us?

- If we only had that pair over the hedge we might do something.'

`Which pair?'

`Mr Boldwood's Tidy and Moll.'

`Then wait here till I come hither again,' said Gabriel. He ran down the hill towards Farmer Boldwood's.

`Farmer Boldwood is not at home,' said Maryann.

`All the better,' said Coggan. `I know what he's gone for.'

Less than five minutes brought up Oak again, running at the same pace, with two halters dangling from his hand.

`Where did you find `em?' said Coggan, turning round and leaping upon the hedge without waiting for an answer.

`Under the eaves. I knew where they were kept,' said Gabriel, following him. `Coggan, you can ride bare-backed? there's no time to look for saddles.'

`Like a hero!' said Jan.

`Maryann, you go to bed,' Gabriel shouted to her from the top of the hedge.

Springing down into Boldwood's pastures, each pocketed his halter to hide it from the horses, who, seeing the men empty-handed, docilely allowed themselves to be seized by the mane, when the halters were dexterously slipped on. Having neither bit nor bridle, Oak and Coggan extemporized the former by passing the rope in each case through the animal's mouth and looping it on the other side. Oak vaulted astride, and Coggan clambered up by aid of the bank, when they ascended to the gate and galloped off in the direction taken by Bathsheba's horse and the robber. Whose vehicle the horse had been harnessed to was a matter of some uncertainty.

Weatherbury Bottom was reached in three or four minutes. They scanned the shady green patch by the roadside. The gipsies were gone.

`The villains!' said Gabriel. `Which way have they gone, I wonder?'

`Straight on, as sure as God made little apples,' said Jan.

`Very well; we are better mounted, and must overtake `era,' said Oak.

`Now on at fall speed!'

No sound of the rider in their van could now be discovered. The road-metal grew softer and more clayey as Weatherbury was left behind, and the late rain had wetted its surface to a somewhat plastic, but not muddy state.

They came to cross-roads. Coggan suddenly pulled up Moll and slipped off.

`What's the matter?' said Gabriel.

`We must try to track `era, since we can't hear 'em,' said Jan, fumbling in his pockets. He struck a light, and held the match to the ground. The rain had been heavier here, and all foot and horse tracks made previous to the storm had been abraded and blurred by the drops, and they were now so many little scoops of water, which reflected the flame of the match like eyes. One set of tracks was fresh and had no water in them; one pair of ruts was also empty, and not small canals, like the others. The footprints forming this recent impression were fall of information as to pace; they were in equidistant pairs, three or four feet apart, the right and left foot of each pair being exactly opposite one another.

`Straight on!' Jan exclaimed. `Tracks like that mean a stiff gallop.