sault. The gates hung in
splinters from the hinges, and a double throng kept pouring in and out
through the entrance, seeking and carrying booty. Meanwhile, in the
upper stories, some resistance was still being offered to the pillagers;
for just as Dick came within eye-shot of the building, a casement was
burst open from within, and a poor wretch in murrey and blue, screaming
and resisting, was forced through the embrasure and tossed into the
street below.

The most sickening apprehension fell upon Dick. He ran forward like one
possessed, forced his way into the house among the foremost, and mounted
without pause to the chamber on the third floor where he had last parted
from Joanna. It was a mere wreck; the furniture had been overthrown, the
cupboards broken open, and in one place a trailing corner of the arras
lay smouldering on the embers of the fire.

Dick, almost without thinking, trod out the incipient conflagration, and
then stood bewildered. Sir Daniel, Sir Oliver, Joanna, all were gone;
but whether butchered in the rout or safe escaped from Shoreby, who
should say?

He caught a passing archer by the tabard.

"Fellow," he asked, "were ye here when this house was taken?"

"Let be," said the archer. "A murrain! let be, or I strike."

"Hark ye," returned Richard, "two can play at that. Stand and be plain."

But the man, flushed with drink and battle, struck Dick upon the
shoulder with one hand, while with the other he twitched away his
garment. Thereupon the full wrath of the young leader burst from his
control. He seized the fellow in his strong embrace, and crushed him on
the plates of his mailed bosom like a child; then, holding him at
arm's-length, he bid him speak as he valued life.

"I pray you mercy!" gasped the archer. "An I had thought ye were so
angry I would 'a' been charier of crossing you. I was here indeed."

"Know ye Sir Daniel?" pursued Dick.

"Well do I know him," returned the man.

"Was he in the mansion?"

"Ay, sir, he was," answered the archer; "but even as we entered by the
yard gate he rode forth by the garden."

"Alone?" cried Dick.

"He may 'a' had a score of lances with him," said the man.

"Lances! No women, then?" asked Shelton.

"Troth, I saw not," said the archer. "But there were none in the house,
if that be your quest."

"I thank you," said Dick. "Here is a piece for your pains." But groping
in his wallet, Dick found nothing. "Inquire for me to-morrow," he
added-