"Father, I need to get away from Nappa," said Kit, breaking the silence. "Ay," said the Squire, with a tolerant laugh, "love takes all men that way in the first flush of it. I was young myself once. You want to ride out, lad, and kill a few score men, just to show little Miss Joan what a likely man o’ your hands you are. Later on, you’ll be glad to be shepherding the ewes, to pay for her new gowns and what not. Love’s not all mist and moonshine, Kit; the sturdier part comes later on." Up the lane sounded the lolopping pit-a-pat of a horse that was tired out and near to drop; and the rider looked in no better case as he drew rein at the gate. "You’re the Squire of Nappa, sir?" he said, with a weary smile. "No weary to ask the question. I was told to find a man as tall as an oak-tree and as sturdy." [Illustration: "’You’re the Squire of Nappa, sir?’ he said."] "Yet it would have been like seeking a needle in a bundle of hay, if you hadn’t chanced to find me at the gate," the other answered. "There are six score Metcalfs in this corner of Yoredale, and nobody takes notice of my height." "The jest is pretty enough, sir, but you’ll not persuade me that there’s a regiment of giants in the dale." "They’re not all of my height—granted. Some are more, and a few less. This is my eldest-born," he said, touching Christopher on the shoulder. "We call him Baby Kit, because he’s the smallest of us all." The horseman saw a lad six foot high, who certainly looked dwarfed as he stood beside his father. "Gad, the King has need of you! Undoubtedly he needs all Metcalfs, if this is your baby-boy." "As for the King, the whole six score of us have prayed for his welfare, Sabbath in and Sabbath out, since we were breeked. It’s good hearing that he needs us." "I ride on His Majesty’s errand. He bids the Squire of Nappa get his men and his white horses together." "So the King has heard of our white horses? Well, we’re proud o’ them, I own." The messenger, used to the stifled atmosphere of Courts until this trouble with the Parliament arrived, was amazed by the downright, free-wind air the Squire of Nappa carried. It tickled his humour, tired as he was, that Metcalf should think the King himself knew every detail of his country, and every corner of it that bred white horses, or roan, or chestnut. At Skipton-in-Craven, of course, they knew the dales from end to end; and he was here because Sir John Mallory, governor of the castle there, had told him the Metcalfs of Nappa were slow to leave the beaten tracks, but that, once roused, they would not budge, or falter, or retreat. "The King needs every Metcalf and his white horse. He sent me with that message to you, Squire." "About when does he need us?" asked Metcalf guardedly. "To-morrow, to be precise."