The White Horses
9781465650054
200 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
Up through the rich valley known now as Wensleydale, but in those days marked by the lustier name of Yoredale, news had crept that there was civil war in England, that sundry skirmishes had been fought already, and that His Majesty was needing all leal men to rally to his standard. It was an early harvest that year, as it happened, and John Metcalf, of Nappa Hall, stood at his garden-gate, watching the sunset glow across his ripening wheat. There were many acres of it, gold between green splashes of grass-land; and he told himself that they would put the sickle into the good crop before a fortnight's end. There was something about Squire Metcalf—six feet four to his height, and broad in the beam—that seemed part of the wide, lush country round him. Weather and land, between them, had bred him; and the night's peace, the smell of sweet-briar in the evening dew, were pleasant foils to his strength. He looked beyond the cornfields presently. Far down the road he saw a horseman—horse and rider small in the middle of the landscape—and wondered what their errand was. When he had done with surmises, his glance roved again, in the countryman's slow way, and rested on the pastures above the house. In the clear light he could see two figures standing there; one was his son Christopher, the other a trim-waisted maid. Squire Metcalf frowned suddenly. He was so proud of his name, of his simple squiredom, that he could not bear to see his eldest-born courting defeat of this kind. This little lady was niece to his neighbour, Sir Timothy Grant, a good neighbour and a friend, but one who was richer than himself in lands and rank, one who went often to the Court in London, and was in great favour with the King. Squire Metcalf had seen these two together in his own house, and guessed Christopher's secret without need of much sagacity; and he was sorely troubled on the lad's account.
