s in the ancient banqueting hall of the fortress --
a long, lofty, rather narrow room, with a heavily-raftered ceiling, two
huge fireplaces, one at either end, and a row of very narrow windows cut
in the great thickness of the wall occupying almost the whole of one
side of the place; whilst a long table was placed against the opposite
wall, with benches beside it, and another smaller table was placed upon
a small raised dais at the far end of the apartment. On this dais was
also set a heavy oaken chair, close beside the glowing hearth; and at
this moment it was plain that the occupant of the chair had been
disturbed by the commotion from without, and had suddenly risen to his
feet, for he stood grasping the oaken arms, his wild gray hair hanging
in matted masses about his seamed and wrinkled face, and his hollow
eyes, in which a fierce light blazed, turned upon the intruders in a
glare of impotent fury.

"Who are ye who thus dare to intrude upon me here? What is all this
tumult I hear in mine own halls?

"Seneschal, art thou there? Send hither to me my soldiers; bid them bind
these men, and carry them to the dungeons. I will see them there. Ha,
ha! I will talk with them there. I will deal with them there. What ho!
Send me the jailer and his assistants! Let them light the fires and heat
hot the irons. Let them prepare our welcome for guests to Saut. Ha, ha!
Ho, ho! These brave gallants shall taste our hospitality. Who brought
them in? Where were they found? Methinks they will prove a rich booty.
Would that good Peter Sanghurst were here to help me in the task of
entertaining these new guests!"

The man was a raving lunatic; that was plain to the most inexperienced
eye from the first moment. He knew not his own niece, he knew not the De
Brocas brothers, though Raymond's face must have been familiar to him
had he been in his right senses. He was still in fancy the undisputed
lord of these wide lands, scouring the country for English travellers or
prisoners of meaner mould; acting here in Gascony much the same part as
the Sanghursts had more cautiously done in England, and as the Barons of
both France and England had long done, though their day of irresponsible
and autocratic power was well-nigh at an end.

He glared upon the brothers and their attendants with savage fury, still
calling out to his men to carry them to the dungeons, still believing
them to be a band of travellers taken prisoners by his own orders,
raving