"Sir, I hate you most devoutly," she said. "Get up the wood again. I used to laugh at all good Puritans, and the memory would hurt me if you stayed."
Kit was never one to hide his light or darkness from a prying world. The whole camp had seen his madness, had marvelled at the change in him—his sudden tempers, his waywardness, his hot impatience for fight of some kind—with his fellows or with any roaming band of enemies that chanced to cross, their path. Now they wondered that he went among them with a new light about his face, a gaiety that was not so heedless as of old, but riper and more charitable.
"The Babe grows up," said Michael to the Squire, as they jogged forward over sultry roads.
"It will be a thrifty growth, lad. If I could say as much of thee, I’d be content."
"Oh, I’m past gibes, sir. Elizabeth, alone of you all—she understands me. We have long ears and long wits, she and I. Believe me, we are wise."
They came at last to their own country, and the Knaresborough men wondered why jest and high spirits ceased among the Riding Metcalfs. They did not guess how rooted in the homeland were the affections of these men who had gone abroad to play their part in the big issue of King and Parliament. They could not divine the mist of tenderness and yearning that veiled their eyes as they saw the slopes of Yoredale run to meet their eager gallop. Wounds, havoc of battlefields that had seen brave hopes lost, all were forgotten. They were back among the greening corn again.
The Squire lost courage, for the first time since the riding out, when he reached the gate of his own homestead and saw his wife run forward in answer to the rousing challenge of "A Mecca for the King!"
She came to his saddle, lifted up her face, as a bride might do for the nuptial kiss. She looked for Kit, the well-beloved, and for Michael. Then her glance ran to and fro among the company, seeking for remembered faces; and memory found many gaps. She faced her husband. There was accusation in her voice; for she had sat at home with weariness and fear and abnegation, and all her strength was gone.
"Serving the King, wife, wherever they be. I’ll go warrant for a Metcalf beyond the gates of this world."