This man will still follow us.
When he does so, yonder wood will lie betwixt you and him. Do you
ride round it and come upon him from behind. There is broad plain
upon his left, and we will cut him off upon the right. If your
horse be indeed the swifter, then you cannot fail to take him."
Nigel had already sprung down and was tightening Pommers' girth.
"Nay, there is no need of haste, for you cannot start until we are
two miles upon our way. And above all I pray you, Nigel, none of
your knight-errant ways. It is this roan that I want, him and the
news that he can bring me. Think little of your own advancement
and much of the needs of the army. When you get him, ride
westwards upon the sun, and you cannot fail to find the road."
Nigel waited with Pommers under the shadow of the nunnery wall,
horse and man chafing with impatience, whilst above them six
round-eyed innocent nun-faces looked down on this strange and
disturbing vision from the outer world. At last the long column
wound itself out of sight round a curve of the road, and the white
dot was gone from the bare green flank of the hill. Nigel bowed
his steel head to the nuns, gave his bridle a shake, and bounded
off upon his welcome mission. The round-eyed sisters saw yellow
horse and twinkling man sweep round the skirt of the wood, caught
a last glimmer of him through the tree-trunks, and paced slowly
back to their pruning and their planting, their minds filled with
the beauty and the terror of that outer world beyond the high gray
lichen-mottled wall.
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