e brought
all of them upon us. As it is, we are in the heart of the keep. We have
now but to make a rush up these winding steps, and methinks we shall find
ourselves on the battlements. They will be so surprised, that no real
resistance can be offered to us. Now let us advance."

So saying Cnut led the way upstairs, followed by the foresters, Cuthbert,
as before, allowing five or six of them to intervene between him and the
leader. He carried his short sword and a quarterstaff, a weapon by no
means to be despised in the hands of an active and experienced player.

Presently, after mounting some fifty or sixty steps, they issued on the
platform of the keep.

Here were gathered some thirty or forty men, who were so busied in
shooting with crossbows, and in working machines casting javelins,
stones, and other missives upon the besiegers, that they were unaware of
the addition to their numbers until the whole of the foresters had
gathered on the summit, and at the order of Cnut suddenly fell upon them
with a loud shout.

Taken wholly by surprise by the foe, who seemed to have risen from the
bowels of the earth by magic, the soldiers of the Baron of Wortham
offered but a feeble resistance. Some were cast over the battlement of
the keep, some driven down staircases, others cut down, and then
Cuthbert, fastening a small white flag he had prepared to his
quarter-staff, waved it above the battlements.

Even now the combatants on the outer wall were in ignorance of what had
happened in the keep; so great was the din that the struggle which had
there taken place had passed unnoticed; and it was not until the
fugitives, rushing out into the courtyard, shouted that the keep had been
captured, that the besieged became aware of the imminence of the danger.

Hitherto the battle had been going well for the defenders of the castle.
The Baron of Wortham was indeed surprised at the feebleness of the
assault. The arrows which had fallen in clouds upon the first day's
attack upon the castle among his soldiers were now comparatively few and
ineffective. The besiegers scarcely appeared to push forward their
bridges with any vigour, and it seemed to him that a coldness had fallen
upon them, and that some disagreement must have arisen between the
foresters and the earl, completely crippling the energy of the attack.

When he heard the words shouted from the courtyard below he could not
believe his ears. That the keep behind should have bee