Young Robin Hood, George Manville Fenn [book reader for pc txt] 📗

beside Little John, as he came up in coat of green with brown belt, a sword by his side, quiver of arrows hung on his back, and longbow in his hand.

"What woodland bird have you got here, John?" he said. And the boy saw that he smiled pleasantly and did not look fierce or threatening.

"A young Robin," said the big fellow; "part of yesterday's plunder."

"I want to find my way home," said the boy. "Will you please show me?"

"But you did not come here into the forest in shirt and hose, did you, my little man?" said the great outlaw.

"No; someone took my cap and doublet away, sir."

Robin Hood frowned.

"Who was it?" he cried angrily. "Find out, John, and he shall have a bowstring about his back. Point out the man who stripped you, my little lad," he continued, turning to the boy.

"It wasn't a man," said the little fellow, "but a boy who minds pigs."

"What, a young swineherd!" cried the outlaw, laughing. "Why did you let him? Why didn't you fight for your clothes like a man?"

"I did," said young Robin stoutly; "but he was so big, he knocked me down and sat upon me."

"Oh! that makes all the difference. How big was he—big as this man?"

Young Robin glanced at the giant who had caught him, and shook his head.

"No," he said; "not half, so big as he is. But he was stronger than I am."

"So I suppose. Well, bring him along. Little John, and let's see if the women can find him some clothes and a cap. You would like something more to wear, wouldn't you?"

"I should like something to eat,"' said the boy sadly. "I have not had anything since breakfast."

"That's not so very long," said Robin Hood. "We have not had anything since breakfast."

"But I mean since breakfast yesterday," said young Robin piteously.

"What!" cried Little John. "Why, the poor boy's starved. But we can soon mend that. Come here!"

Young Robin's first movement was to shrink from the big fellow, but he smiled down in such a bluff, amiable way, that the boy gave him his hands, and in an instant he was swung up and sitting six feet in the air upon the great fellow's shoulder, and then rode off to an open-fronted shed-like place thatched with reeds, Robin Hood, with his bow over his shoulder, walking by the side.

"Here, Marian," cried the outlaw, and young Robin's heart gave a throb and he made a movement to get down to go to the sweet-faced woman who came hurriedly out, wide-eyed and wondering, in her green kirtle, her long soft naturally curling hair rippling down her back, but confined round her brow by a plain silver band in which a few woodland flowers were placed.

"Oh! Robin," she cried, flushing with pleasure; "who is this?"

"It is some one for you to take care of," said the outlaw, who smiled at the bright look in the girl's face. "He is both hungry and tired, and his people ran away and left him alone in the forest."

"Oh, my dear!" she cried, as Little John lightly jumped the boy down at her feet. "Come along."

Young Robin put his hand in hers and gave her a look full of trust and confidence, before turning to the two men, for all his troubles seemed over now.

"Thank you for bringing me here," he said; "but are you bold Robin
Hood and Little John, of whom I've heard my father talk?"

"I daresay we are the men he has talked about," said the outlaw smiling; "but who is your father, and what did he say?"

"My father is the Sheriff of Nottingham," said the boy, "and he said that he was going to catch you and your men some day, for you were very wicked and bad. But he did not know how good and kind you are, and I shall tell him when you send me home."

The two men exchanged glances with Maid Marian.

"We shall see," said the outlaw; "but you are nearly starved, aren't you?"

"Yes, very, very hungry," said the boy, looking piteously at his new protector, whose hand he held.

"Hungry?" she cried.

"Yes, he has had nothing since yesterday morning; but you can cure that."

"Oh, my dear, my dear!" cried the woman. And she hurried young Robin beneath the shelter, and in a very short time he was smiling up in her face in his thankfulness, for she had placed before him a bowl of sweet new milk and some of the nicest bread he had ever tasted.

As he ate hungrily he had to answer Maid Marian's questions about who he was and how he came there, which he did readily, and it did not strike him as being very dreadful that the mules and their loads had been seized, for old David had been very cross and severe with him for getting tired, and these people in the forest were most kind.

CHAPTER IV

It was a very strange life for a boy who had been accustomed to every comfort, but young Robin enjoyed it, for everything seemed to be so new and fresh, and the men treated him as if he had come to them for the purpose of being made into a pet.

They were, of course, fierce outlaws and robbers, ready to turn their bows and swords against anyone; but the poor people who lived in and about the forest liked and helped them, for Robin Hood's men never did them harm, while as to young Robin, they were all eager to take him out with them and show him the wonders of the forest.

On the second day after his arrival in the camp, the boy asked when he was to be shown the way home, and he asked again on the third day, but only to be told each time that he should go soon.

On the fourth day he forgot to ask, for he was busy with big Little John, who smiled with satisfaction when young Robin chose to stay with him instead of going with some of the men into the forest after a deer.

Young Robin forgot to ask when he was to be shown the way home, because Little John had promised to make him a bow and arrows and to teach him how to use them. The great tall outlaw kept his word too, and long before evening he hung a cap upon a broken bough of an oak tree and set young Robin to work about twenty yards away shooting arrows at the mark.

"You've got to hit that every time you shoot," said Little John; "and when you can do that at twenty yards you have got to do it at forty. Now begin."

For the bow was ready and made of a piece of yew, and half a dozen arrows had been finished.

"Think you can hit it?" said Little John, after showing the boy how to string his bow and fit the notch of the arrow to the string.

"Oh! yes," said Robin confidently.

"That's right! then you will soon be able to kill a deer."

"But I don't want to kill a deer," said the boy. "I want to see some, but I shouldn't like to kill one."

"Wait till you're hungry, my fine fellow," said Little John, laughing. "But my word! you look fine this morning; just like one of us. Did Maid Marian make you that green jerkin?"

"Yes," said the boy.

"That's right; so's your cap and feather. But now then, try if you can hit the cap. Draw the arrow right to the head before you let it go. My word, what funny little fumbling fingers yours are!"

"Are they?" cried Robin, who thought that his teacher's hands were the biggest he had ever seen.

"Like babies' fingers," said Little John, smiling down at the boy as if very much amused. "Now then, draw right to the head."

"I can't," said the boy; "it's so hard."

"That's because you are not used to it, little one. Try again. Hold tight, and pull hard. Steadily. That's the way. Now loose it and let it go."

Young Robin did as he was told, and away went the arrow down between the trees, to fall with its feathered wings just showing above the fallen leaves.

"That didn't hit the cap," said Little John. "Never went near."

Young Robin shook his head.

"Did you look at the cap when you loosed the arrow?"

"No," said Robin; "I shut my eyes."

"Try again then, and keep them open."

Robin tried and tried again till he had sent off all six of his shafts, and then he stood and looked up at Little John, and Little John looked down at him.

"You couldn't kill a deer for dinner to-day," said the big fellow.

"No," said young Robin; "it's so hard. Could you have hit it?"

"I think I could if I stood ten times as far away," said the great fellow quietly.

"Oh, do try, please," cried Robin.

"Very well; only let's pick up your arrows first, or we may lose some of them. Always pick up your arrows while they are fresh—I mean, while you can remember where they are."

The shafts were picked up, mostly by Little John, whose eyes were very sharp at seeing where the little arrows lay; and then they walked back, and Robin had to run by his big companion's side, for he began to stride away, counting as he went, till he had taken two hundred steps from the tree all along one of the alleys of the forest, when he stopped short.

"Now then, my little bowman," he said; "think I can hit the mark now?"

"No," said Robin decisively; "we're too far away. I can hardly see the cap."

"Well, let's try," said Little John, stringing his bow, and then carefully selecting an arrow from the quiver at his back. This arrow he drew two or three times through his hand so as to smooth the feathering and make the web lie straight, before fitting the notch to the string.

"So you think it's too far?" said Little John.

"Yes, ever so much."

"Ah, well, we'll try," said the big fellow coolly. "Where-about shall I hit the cap—in the middle?"

[Illustration: "Ah, well, we'll try," said Little John.
"Whereabouts shall I hit the cap?"]

"No," said Robin; "just at the top of the brim."

"Very well," said the big fellow, standing up very straight and rather sidewise, as he held his bow at his left arm's length, slowly drew the arrow to the head, and then as Robin gazed in the direction of the indistinctly seen hat hanging on the tree-trunk—

Twang!

The arrow had been loosed, and the bow had given forth a strange deep musical sound.

Robin looked sharply at Little John, and the big outlaw looked down at him.

"Where did that arrow go?" said the boy.

"Let's see," said Little John.

"I don't think we shall ever find it again," continued Robin.

They walked back, the outlaw very slowly, and Robin quite fast so as to keep up with him.

"Perhaps not," said Little John, "but I don't often lose my arrows."

"This one has gone right through the ferns," thought Robin, and he felt glad with the thought of the big fellow having missed the mark, but as they walked nearer, he kept his eyes fixed upon the great trunk dimly seen in the shade, being tripped up twice by the bracken fronds; but he saved himself from a fall and watched the tree trunk still, while the hat hanging on the old bough grew plainer, just as it had been before.

They had walked back nearly three parts of the way when Robin suddenly saw something which made him start, for there was a tiny bit of something white above something dark, and those marks were not on the brim of the hat before.

The next minute Robin's eyes began to open wider, for he knew that he was looking at the feathered end of the arrow, pointing straight at him; and directly after, as he stepped a little on one side to avoid an ant-hill, he could see the whole of the arrow except