Page:Tudor Jenks--The defense of the castle.djvu/51

Rh creature in the woods, and ran after it—a fox, or some bird."

Hugh said no more, but the incident gave him more uneasiness than he had confessed, and left him vigilant. While Edgar and Amabel rode on, keeping a lookout for some quarry at which to fly their hawks, Hugh rode at a distance behind them, taking advantage of every bit of higher ground to survey the surrounding country. His experience as a soldier had taught him the value of studying the features of every possible battleground, and had also given him some little skill in map-making. He had taken with him from the castle that morning a sheet of parchment, an ink-horn and a quill-pen; and from time to time he added lines or words to a chart of the region round-about the castle—a chart the main outlines of which he had copied from one that hung upon the wall of the great hall in the castle. Very few men of Hugh's rank could write; but he had been intended for the church, and was convent-bred. When about eighteen, he had run away into the woods, where it was believed he was one of Robin Hood's men, and afterward became a soldier, but he still retained enough knowledge of his convent-training to make him seem to his soldier-comrades—and even to some of the nobility—a marvel of learning. He never paraded his learning, since