red in his livery of murrey and blue,
partly nondescript strangers attracted to the town by greed, and received
by the knight through policy, and because it was the fashion of the time.

The snow, which still fell without interruption, the extreme chill of the
air, and the approach of night, combined to keep them under shelter.
Wine, ale, and money were all plentiful; many sprawled gambling in the
straw of the barn, many were still drunken from the noontide meal. To
the eye of a modern it would have looked like the sack of a city; to the
eye of a contemporary it was like any other rich and noble household at a
festive season.

Two monks--a young and an old--had arrived late, and were now warming
themselves at a bonfire in a corner of the shed. A mixed crowd
surrounded them--jugglers, mountebanks, and soldiers; and with these the
elder of the two had soon engaged so brisk a conversation, and exchanged
so many loud guffaws and country witticisms, that the group momentarily
increased in number.

The younger companion, in whom the reader has already recognised Dick
Shelton, sat from the first somewhat backward, and gradually drew himself
away. He listened, indeed, closely, but he opened not his mouth; and by
the grave expression of his countenance, he made but little account of
his companion's pleasantries.

At last his eye, which travelled continually to and fro, and kept a guard
upon all the entrances of the house, lit upon a little procession
entering by the main gate and crossing the court in an oblique direction.
Two ladies, muffled in thick furs, led the way, and were followed by a
pair of waiting-women and four stout men-at-arms. The next moment they
had disappeared within the house; and Dick, slipping through the crowd of
loiterers in the shed, was already giving hot pursuit.

"The taller of these twain was Lady Brackley," he thought; "and where
Lady Brackley is, Joan will not be far."

At the door of the house the four men-at-arms had ceased to follow, and
the ladies were now mounting the stairway of polished oak, under no
better escort than that of the two waiting-women. Dick followed close
behind. It was already the dusk of the day; and in the house the
darkness of the night had almost come. On the stair-landings, torches
flared in iron holders; down the long, tapestried corridors, a lamp
burned by every door. And where the door stood open, Dick could look in
upon arras-covered walls and rush-bescat