Chapter 1 - Page 2

depart a
hair's-breadth from his; and fifty years of arrogant port had stiffened
a neck too stiff at birth. Even now in the dim light his large square
form stood out against the sky like a cromlech, and his heavy arms swung
like gnarled boughs of oak, for a storm of wrath was moving him. In
his youth he had rebelled against his father; and now his own son was a
rebel to him.

"Good, my boy, good!" he said, within his grizzled beard, while his eyes
shone with fire, like the flints beneath his horse; "you have had your
own way, have you, then? But never shall you step upon an acre of
your own, and your timber shall be the gallows. Done, my boy, once and
forever."

Philip, the squire, the son of Richard, and father of Duncan Yordas,
with fierce satisfaction struck the bosom of his heavy Bradford
riding-coat, and the crackle of parchment replied to the blow, while
with the other hand he drew rein on the brink of the Tees sliding
rapidly.

The water was dark with the twinkle of the stars, and wide with the
vapor of the valley, but Philip Yordas in the rage of triumph laughed
and spurred his reflecting horse.

"Fool!" he cried, without an oath--no Yordas ever used an oath except in
playful moments--"fool! what fear you? There hangs my respected father's
chain. Ah, he was something like a man! Had I ever dared to flout him
so, he would have hanged me with it."

Wild with his wrong, he struck the rowel deep into the flank of his
wading horse, and in scorn of the depth drove him up the river. The
shoulders of the swimming horse broke the swirling water, as he panted
and snorted against it; and if Philip Yordas had drawn back at once, he
might even now have crossed safely. But the fury of his blood was up,
the stronger the torrent the fiercer his will, and the fight between
passion and power went on. The poor horse was fain to swerve back at
last; but he struck him on the head with a carbine, and shouted to the
torrent:

"Drown me, if you can. My father used to say that I was never born
to drown. My own water drown me! That would be a little too much
insolence."

"Too much insolence" were his last words. The strength of the horse was
exhausted. The beat of his legs grew short and faint, the white of his
eyes rolled piteously, and the gurgle of his breath subsided. His
heavy head dropped under water, and his sodden crest rolled over, like
sea-weed where a wave breaks. The stream had him all at its mercy, and
showed no more than his savage master had, but swept him a wallowing
lump away, and over the reef of the crossing. With both feet locked in
the twisted stirrups, and right arm broken at the elbow, the rider