The Forest - Edward Rutherfurd [55]
There was no trace of them. Their horses were not there. He looked out, scanning the heath below and saw no sign of any movement. Were they somewhere nearby, hidden from view in the bracken or the long grass? He searched about, but found nothing.
They had been and gone. They had ridden off together. And then? He knew he must not imagine too much, but it was impossible. With a sick feeling in his stomach, it seemed to him that he knew it. They were together.
His nerves strung taut, his pulse beating fast, he rode about, asking in Burley if they had been seen and looking out over various nearby high points. There was nothing. He returned slowly to the valley, thinking to check back at his home. Perhaps, he told himself, he had been mistaken. But if not he would come back to the Forest and try again.
Adela had been cautious as she approached Brockenhurst. On the one hand she had to find Walter, but on the other she must avoid Cola. She certainly could not tell the old man why she had disobeyed his orders and he would probably send her home before she could accomplish her mission.
As she came close to the royal hunting lodge, however, she had what seemed to be a piece of luck. She saw Puckle, standing alone by his cart. When she asked him where the king’s party were, he looked thoughtful, then said that they had gone northwards, somewhere above Lyndhurst.
This was good news indeed. The area was wooded. Perhaps she could intercept Walter without being spotted. Asking Puckle to say nothing of having seen her she set off, with a lighter heart, towards the north.
Not until some time after her husband had left did the Lady Maud stir from her usual position of resting in the solar. But when she did she astonished the entire household by demanding not only her outdoor clothes but that her horse should be saddled as well.
‘You do not mean to ride, My Lady?’ her maidservant enquired anxiously.
‘Yes. I do.’
‘But My Lady, you are so weak.’
It was true that, after so much inactivity, the Lady Maud was hardly steady on her feet. But despite all the woman’s remonstrances she insisted: ‘I shall ride.’ There was nothing they could do about it. One brave servant ventured to say that the master would not like it, but was cut with such a mean little look that he shrivelled back against the wall.
‘That is between me and him, not you,’ she said coldly and told them to bring the horse round to the door.
Moments later, while the groom held the bridle, they were helping her to mount.
‘Please, My Lady, you could fall,’ the groom now begged. ‘Let me at least accompany you.’
‘No.’ Abruptly she turned her horse’s head away and started off at a walk. So she proceeded, wobbling once or twice, pale-faced, looking straight ahead, all the way down the long village street, while the cottagers came out to watch her pass. She started up the track that her husband had taken. She swayed, seemed about to fall, but pressed on.
She was following him. Her journey was instinctive. Did she know that she had lost his love? She sensed it. Did she know he had gone to another woman? She guessed it. And something in her, an animal knowledge, told her she must get well, and ride and take him back. So that August day she rode out in front of them all, kept in the saddle by her will alone. At the top of the rise she urged her horse into a canter, and those who saw it below gasped and muttered: ‘Dear God, she will be killed.’
The king’s hunting party had set out gaily from Brockenhurst, accompanied by Cola.
‘My faithful huntsman. I can always trust you to do everything perfectly.’ Rufus was in a good humour. His sharp eyes bored into the old huntsman; then he laughed. ‘I don’t want to drive the deer into your great trap today, my friend. I want to hunt the woods.’
Hounds had been produced. There were two kinds: the tufters, agile scenting hounds, whose job was to sniff out the deer and spring them from the dense covert; and the running hounds which, today, would only be used to