With this not over-clear direction Walter Skinner was obliged to be content. Bidding the groom to bring the horse to the door of the inn at once, he hurried away, paid his reckoning, examined carefully the string of his bow, and looked over his store of arrows. "And now, Josceline, son of Lord De Aldithely," he said, "my arrow will bid thee halt this time, and not my voice. And thou, Richard Wood, who didst say, 'We hunt no more in company,' what wouldst thou give to know of this place in the Isle of Axholme? And thou mayst have thy men-at-arms to bear thee company, and to pay for when thou art done with them. They cost thee more than a bow and some arrows cost me, nor will they do thee one half the good." So thinking he bestrode the vicious beast which backed and plunged about the inn yard, and from which the grooms and the watching maids fled in all directions. Walter Skinner, however, was not to be unseated, and, the horse being headed in the right direction, his next plunge carried him out of the yard and fairly started him on his way, the spur of his rider giving him no permission to halt for a moment. "And now," thought Walter Skinner, when he had crossed the Don and was free of the town, "what said the knave groom? I must go till I come to it. Ay, and who knoweth when that shall be, and who knoweth the way in this pitfall of bogs? Three scrub trees, saith he, and all together on one little solid place. I would I might see three little scrub trees." His horse had been over the Isle before and, being given his head, began to pick his way so cleverly that Walter Skinner was still further elated. He sat up pompously and pictured himself a courtier at the palace as a reward for this day's work. "For I lean not to golden rewards alone," he said. "No doubt it can be managed that from this day I begin to rise. The king hath advanced baser men than I, let Richard Wood think as he will in the matter." And now he descried the three little scrub trees; but he saw not the horses, they having been taken to another islet for pasture; nor Fleetfoot, who had gone with Hugo and Humphrey. "The knave groom spake true," said Walter Skinner, with satisfaction. "There be the rushes on which they lie, and there the ashes of the fire. I will seek out a convenient hiding-place in the reeds, and to-night, when the fire blazeth bright, then shall my arrows sing." So saying he sought a place of concealment for himself and his horse, and, having found it, and tied the horse securely, he lay down well satisfied. Hugo and Humphrey did not return till toward evening. They had caught some fish in the Trent and roasted them on the coals for their dinner, and afterward had come leisurely back, enjoying the scenes and sights of the marsh.