So passed the summer. We did not ride again to Teramore, nor did Sir Geoffrey come to Mountjoy. Once I learned that he visited the Lady of Mannerley; and Cedric and I took the same day to pay our own respects. We had much good talk of the outlaw band and of the great day that was now fast approaching, but of Lady Carleton and the new peace that reigned between Mountjoy and Carleton no word was spoken. Came a day in fair October that minded me full sharply of that one a year agone whereon I had met Lionel of Carleton in the woods of Teramore. The men of Mountjoy were early astir, and four score strong, counting the men-at-arms, the cross-bow men and the foresters with their long-bows and cloth-yard shafts, were making toward their post on the hither side of Blackpool Wood. On our left, two furlongs off, were Lord Pelham and his archers; to the right the score or so of Mannerly retainers and Squire Dunwoodie with half a hundred yeomen. On the far side of the forest, three leagues away, we knew that young Sir Geoffrey with dour-faced old Hubert led nigh two hundred Carleton men-at-arms and bowmen, and Lionel of Montmorency a hundred more. We were to march in open line, converging toward the center of the wood at grim Blackpool. Any of the robbers found in hiding were to be captured or slain; and whichever leader first encountered the outlaws in force was to give three long notes on his hunting horn. Then half the forces of all the others were immediately to join him, leaving the remainder to guard all lines of possible escape. Our plans had been well kept secret amongst the leaders; not one of our own men knew them until that very morning. Withal it promised to be a most unlucky day for those cut-throat knaves who had so long cheated the gallows. Our march was slow, as well might be in all those brakes and rocky glens. Now and again a lurking knave in Lincoln green was found and quickly made prisoner—or, if he made resistance, even more quickly disposed of. Some, however, were too fleet of foot for capture by our more heavily burdened men; and, after sending a shaft or two at the line of skirmishers, made good their escape into the wood before us. ’Twas ten by the sun when we heard, from Dunwoodie, far on our right, the three long blasts of the horn. Instantly my father and I took half our men, and leaving the rest under old Marvin, the archer, ran through the forest toward the fray. Afterward we learned to our cost that some of our leaders took not so careful thought of the places of their forces in the skirmish line, but rushed off at once to the alarm, followed by well nigh their whole companies, leaving in places gaps of a mile or more in what should have been our close-drawn cordon.