Chapter 5

CHAPTER IV - A GREENWOOD COMPANY

Matcham was well rested and revived; and the two lads, winged by
what Dick had seen, hurried through the remainder of the outwood,
crossed the road in safety, and began to mount into the high ground
of Tunstall Forest. The trees grew more and more in groves, with
heathy places in between, sandy, gorsy, and dotted with old yews.
The ground became more and more uneven, full of pits and hillocks.
And with every step of the ascent the wind still blew the shriller,
and the trees bent before the gusts like fishing-rods.

They had just entered one of the clearings, when Dick suddenly
clapped down upon his face among the brambles, and began to crawl
slowly backward towards the shelter of the grove. Matcham, in
great bewilderment, for he could see no reason for this flight,
still imitated his companion's course; and it was not until they
had gained the harbour of a thicket that he turned and begged him
to explain.

For all reply, Dick pointed with his finger.

At the far end of the clearing, a fir grew high above the
neighbouring wood, and planted its black shock of foliage clear
against the sky. For about fifty feet above the ground the trunk
grew straight and solid like a column. At that level, it split
into two massive boughs; and in the fork, like a mast-headed
seaman, there stood a man in a green tabard, spying far and wide.
The sun glistened upon his hair; with one hand he shaded his eyes
to look abroad, and he kept slowly rolling his head from side to
side, with the regularity of a machine.

The lads exchanged glances.

"Let us try to the left," said Dick. "We had near fallen foully,
Jack."

Ten minutes afterwards they struck into a beaten path.

"Here is a piece of forest that I know not," Dick remarked. "Where
goeth me this track?"

"Let us even try," said Matcham.

A few yards further, the path came to the top of a ridge and began
to go down abruptly into a cup-shaped hollow. At the foot, out of
a thick wood of flowering hawthorn, two or three roofless gables,
blackened as if by fire, and a single tall chimney marked the ruins
of a house.

"What may this be?" whispered Matcham.

"Nay, by the mass, I know not," answered Dick. "I am all at sea.
Let us go warily."

With beating hearts, they descended through the hawthorns. Here
and there, they passed signs of recent cultivation; fruit trees and
pot herbs ran wild among the thicket; a sun-dial had fallen in the
grass; it seemed they were treading what once had been a garden.
Yet a little farther and they came forth before the ruins of the
house.

It had been a pleasant mansion and a strong. A dry ditch was dug
deep about it;