"You shall have an answer presently," replied Catesby; and, stooping down over his saddle bow, he conversed for a moment or two with one of the men who had been first upon the ground, and who now stood dismounted by his side. Then raising his head again, he said: "There were three people left your company, my lord, a moment or two since. Two have returned, I am told, and one was received into the abbey. Who was that person?" "You must ask those who went with her," replied Chartley. "They have known her longer than I have, and can answer better. My acquaintance with her"--he added, as he saw a meaning smile come upon Sir Edward Hungerford's lip--"my acquaintance with her has been very short, and is very slight. I have acted as was my devoir towards a lady, and have nought farther to say upon the subject." "Then your would have me believe it was a woman," rejoined Catesby. "Ay, was it, master," answered the woodman, standing forward and speaking in a rough tone; "or rather, as the lord says, a lady. She was sent out by the lady abbess, as the custom sometimes is, to the cell of St. Magdalene, there upon the hill; and when she would have gone back, she found the houses on the green in a flame, and all the wood surrounded by your soldiers. I wish I had known it in time, and I would have contrived to get her back again, in spite of all your plundering thieves. But the king shall know of all you have done, if I walk on foot to Leicester to tell him." "If it was a lady, pray, goodman, who was the lady?" demanded Sir Edward Hungerford, laughing lightly. "What is that to you?" exclaimed the woodman, turning sharply upon him. "If she was a lady, forsooth!--I might well say when I look at you, 'If you are a man,' for of that there may be some doubt; but nobody could look at her face, and ask if she were a lady." A low laugh ran round, which heightened the colour in Sir Edward Hungerford's smooth cheek; but Catesby, after speaking again to the man beside him in a low tone, fixed his eyes upon the woodman, and demanded-- "Who are you, my good friend, who put yourself so forward?" "I am head woodman of the abbey," answered Boyd, "and master forester; and by the charter of King Edward III. I am empowered to stop and turn back, or apprehend and imprison, any one whom I may find roaming the forest, except upon the public highway. I should have done so before this hour, if I had had force enough; for we have more vagabonds in the forest than I like. But I shall soon have bills and bows enough at my back; for I have sent, to raise the country round. Such things as have been done this night shall not happen within our meres, and go unpunished;" and he crossed his arms upon his broad chest and gazed sternly in Catesby's face. "Upon my life you are bold!" exclaimed Richard's favourite. "Do you know to whom you are speaking?"