“The green bowmen, senor,” said Gonzalez. “Ah, Shadow Valley!”
“We left it yesterday,” said Rodriguez.
When Gonzalez heard this he poured forth questions. “The forest, senor; how is it now with the forest? Do the boars still drink at Heather Pool? Do the geese go still to Greatmarsh? They should have come early this year. How is it with Larios, Raphael, Migada? Who shoots woodcock now?”
The questions flowed on past answering, past remembering: he had not spoken of the forest for years. And Rodriguez answered as such questions are always answered, saying that all was well, and giving Gonzalez some little detail of some trifling affair of the forest, which he treasured as small shells are treasured in inland places when travellers bring them from the sea; but all that he heard of the forest seemed to the smith like something gathered on a far shore of time. Yes, he had been a bowman once.
But he had no horses. One horse that drew a cart, but no horses for riding at all. And Rodriguez thought of the immense miles lying between him and the foreign land, keeping him back from his ambition; they all pressed on his mind at once. The smith was sorry, but he could not make horses.
“Show him your coin, master,” said Morano.
“Ah, a small token,” said Rodriguez, drawing it forth still on its green ribbon under his clothing. “The bowman’s badge, is it not?”
Gonzalez looked at it, then looked at Rodriguez.
“Master,” he said, “you shall have your horses. Give me time: you shall have them. Enter, master.” And he bowed and widely opened the door. “If you will breakfast in my house while I go to the neighbours you shall have some horses, master.”
So they entered the house, and the smith with many bows gave the travellers over to the care of his wife, who saw from her husband’s manner that these were persons of importance and as such she treated them both, and as such entertained them to their second breakfast. And this meant they ate heartily, as travellers can, who can go without a breakfast or eat two; and those who dwell in cities can do neither.
And while the plump dame did them honour they spoke no word of the forest, for they knew not what place her husband’s early years had in her imagination.
They had barely finished their meal when the sound of hooves on cobbles was heard and Gonzalez beat on the door. They all went to the door and found him there with two horses. The horses were saddled and bridled. They fixed the stirrups to please them, then the travellers mounted at once. Rodriguez made his grateful farewell to the wife of the smith: then, turning to Gonzalez, he pointed to the two tired horses which had waited all the while with their reins thrown over a hook on the wall.
“Let the owner of these have them till his own come back,” he said, and added: “How far may I take these?”
“They are good horses,” said the smith.
“Yes,” said Rodriguez.
“They could do fifty miles to-day,” Gonzalez continued, “and to morrow, why, forty, or a little more.”
“And where will that bring me?” said Rodriguez, pointing to the straight road which was going his way, north-eastward.
“That,” said Gonzalez, “that should bring you some ten or twenty miles short of Saspe.”
“And where shall I leave the horses?” Rodriguez asked.
“Master,” Gonzalez said, “in any village where there be a smith, if you say ‘these are the horses of the smith Gonzalez, who will come for them one day from here,’ they will take them in for you, master.”
“But,” and Gonzalez walked a little away from his wife, and the horses walked and he went beside them, “north of here none knows the bowmen. You will get no fresh horses, master. What will you do?”
“Walk,” said Rodriguez.
Then they said farewell, and there was a look on the face of the smith almost such as the sons of men might have worn in Genesis when angels visited them briefly.
They settled down into a steady trot and trotted thus for three hours. Noon came, and still there was no rest for Morano, but only dust and the monotonous sight of the road, on which his eyes were fixed: nearly an hour more passed, and at last he saw his master halt and turn round in his saddle.
“Dinner,” Rodriguez said.
All Morano’s weariness vanished: it was the hour of the frying-pan once more.
They had done more than twenty-one miles from the house of Gonzalez. Nimbly enough, in his joy at feeling the ground again, Morano ran and gathered sticks from the bushes. And soon he had a fire, and a thin column of grey smoke going up from it that to him was always home.
When the frying-pan warmed and lard sizzled, when the smell of bacon mingled with the smoke, then Morano was where all wise men and all unwise try to be, and where some of one or the other some times come for awhile, by unthought paths and are gone again; for that smoky, mixed odour was happiness.
Not for long men and horses rested, for soon Rodriguez’ ambition was drawing him down the road again, of which he knew that there remained to be travelled over two hundred miles in Spain, and how much beyond that he knew not, nor greatly cared, for beyond the frontier of Spain he believed there lay the dim, desired country of romance where roads were long no more and no rain fell. They mounted again and pushed on for this country. Not a village they saw but that Morano hoped that here his affliction would end and that he would dismount and rest; and always Rodriguez rode on and Morano followed, and with a barking of dogs they were gone and the village rested behind them. For many an hour their slow trot carried them on; and Morano, clutching the saddle with worn arms, already was close to despair, when Rodriguez halted in a little village at evening before an inn. They had done their fifty miles from the house of Gonzalez, and even a little more.
Morano rolled from his horse and beat on the small green door. Mine host came out and eyed them, preening the point of his beard; and Rodriguez sat his horse and looked at him. They had not the welcome here that Gonzalez gave them; but there was a room to spare for Rodriguez, and Morano was promised what he asked for, straw; and there was shelter to be had for the horses. It was all the travellers needed.
Children peered at the strangers, gossips peeped out of doors to gather material concerning them, dogs noted their coming, the eyes of the little village watched them curiously, but Rodriguez and Morano passed into the house unheeding; and past those two tired men the mellow evening glided by like a dream. Tired though Rodriguez was he noticed a certain politeness in mine host while he waited at supper, which had not been noticeable when he had first received him, and rightly put this down to some talk of Morano’s; but he did not guess that Morano had opened wide blue eyes and, babbling to his host, had guilelessly told him that his master a week ago had killed an uncivil inn-keeper.
Scarcely were late birds home before Rodriguez sought his bed, and not all of them were sleeping before he slept.
Another morning shone, and appeared to Spain, and all at once Rodriguez was wide awake. It was the eighth day of his wanderings.
When he had breakfasted and paid his due in silver he and Morano departed, leaving mine host upon his doorstep bowing with an almost perplexed look on his shrewd face as he took the points of moustachios and beard lightly in turn between finger and thumb: for we of our day enter vague details about ourselves in the book downstairs when we stay at inns, but it was mine host’s custom to gather all that with his sharp eyes. Whatever he gathered, Rodriguez and Morano were gone.
But soon their pace dwindled, the trot slackening and falling to a walk; soon Rodriguez learned what it is to travel with tired horses. To Morano riding was merely riding, and the discomforts of that were so great that he noticed no difference. But to Rodriguez, his continual hitting and kicking his horse’s sides, his dislike of doing it, the uselessness of it when done, his ambition before and the tired beast underneath, the body always some yards behind the beckoning spirit, were as great vexation as a traveller knows. It came to dismounting and walking miles on foot; even then the horses hung back. They halted an hour over dinner while the horses grazed and rested, and they returned to their road refreshed by the magic that was in the frying-pan, but the horses were no fresher.