By Loch and by Lin Read Online Free PDF Page B

slumber deep. The harper looked them over and laughed to see that every soul was asleep.
    Then quickly he slipped off his shoon and softly crept down the stair to the outer court below, near the town, to see how matters stood there.
    There was never a body in sight, and the stable door was standing wide. Finding a lantern to give him light, the harper quietly stole inside.
    Five and thirty horses stood, stamping their feet and champing their food. Three and thirty the harper passed without a glance till he came at last to his old gray mare by that steed of great renown, King Henry’s favorite, Wanton Brown.
    He took the halter from under his cloak and set the lantern out of the way. The halter he slipped o’er the nose of the brown and tied it fast to the tail of the gray.
    Then he led the mare to a small back gate that opened out on the town, and step for step as she trotted along came King Henry’s favorite, Wanton Brown. He set the mare free with a thump on her rump. “Be off, auld lass!” cried he. And like an arrow shot from a bow, off at a gallop went she. Down the road, and over the bridge, and in and out of the town the gray mare sped, and close behind galloped the Wanton Brown.
    When the noise of their hoofs was heard no more the harper slipped back to the castle hall and, bent o’er his harp, he went to sleep with the king, his nobles, and knights, and all.
    The old gray mare was swift of foot and she tarried for naught along the way. To the harper’s door in Lochmaben town she brought herself and the Wanton Brown at the breaking of the day.
    â€œLass, get up!” called the harper’s wife. “And help your master stable the mare.”
    The serving lass peeped out the door and saw the two horses standing there.
    â€œMistress,” she cried. “The master’s not come, but a wonderful sight to see! The gray mare’s had another foal, and it’s bigger by far than she!”
    â€œOch, ye silly wench!” said the harper’s wife. “It’s daft wi’ sleep you be! Come ben the house and go back to bed. I’ll get up and go myself to put the mare in the shed.”
    The harper’s wife clapped her hands for joy and chuckled at the sight of the old gray mare and Wanton Brown in the early morning light. “Get in to your foal,” she said to the mare. “You’ve done a good job this night.”
    She loosed the lead from the gray mare’s tail and foddered and bedded the two of them down. Then she locked the shed that none might know that it held that steed of great renown, King Henry’s Wanton Brown.
    The groom woke up in the castle hall early in the morn. To the stable he went where the horses stood, stamping their feet and champing their corn. Three and thirty horses there were where five and thirty there should be. The groom gave a blink at the empty stall and cried out, “Woe is me!” He hurried back to the castle hall on legs that shook with fear, and shouted like one whose wits are gone, “King Henry’s Wanton Brown’s awa’, and so is the silly old harper’s mare!”
    The harper feigned to weep and lament. “Och, a wretched body I am! The English loons have stolen my mare, and she with a newborn foal at home that’ll die without its dam!”
    â€œIf there be rogues in Carlisle town, I’ve suffered for it too,” said the king. “They’ve stolen my Wanton Brown, so I’ve lost a horse as well as you.”
    Said the harper, “My loss is twice as great!” and he cursed and tore his hair. “You’ve lost one horse but I have lost two, for I’ll lose the foal as well as the mare.”
    â€œHold your tongue!” King Henry said. “You’ll have no cause to lament and swear. I’ll give you thirty guineas to pay for your foal, and three times thirty to pay for your mare!”
    Little did King Henry know ’twas the harper