em escape and save
themselves.

"The farm," he whispered, "where they say my Lord Hastings is quartered
is scarcely a mile and a half away; pass the garden wicket, leave
Gladsmore Chase to the left hand, take the path to the right, through
the wood, and you will see its roof among the apple-blossoms. Our Lady
protect you, and say a word to my lord on behalf of poor Ned."

Scarce had he seen his guests descend into the garden before he heard
the yell of the tymbesteres, in the opposite part of the house, as
they ran from room to room after their prey. He hastened to regain the
kitchen; and presently the tymbesteres, breathless and panting, rushed
in, and demanded their victims.

"Marry," quoth the landlord, with the self-possession of a cunning old
soldier-"think ye I cumbered my house with such cattle after pretty
lasses like you had given me the inkling of what they were? No wizard
shall fly away with the sign of the Talbot, if I can help it. They
skulked off I can promise ye, and did not even mount a couple of
broomsticks which I handsomely offered for their ride up to London."

"Thunder and bombards!" cried a trooper, already half-drunk, and seizing
Graul in his iron arms, "put the conjuror out of thine head now, and
buss me, Graul, buss me!"

Then the riot became hideous; the soldiers, following their comrade's
example, embraced the grim glee-women, tearing and hauling them to and
fro, one from the other, round and round, dancing, hallooing, chanting,
howling, by the blaze of a mighty fire,--many a rough face and hard hand
smeared with blood still wet, communicating the stain to the cheeks and
garb of those foul feres, and the whole revel becoming so unutterably
horrible and ghastly, that even the veteran landlord fled from the spot,
trembling and crossing himself. And so, streaming athwart the lattice,
and silvering over that fearful merry-making, rose the moon.

But when fatigue and drunkenness had done their work, and the soldiers
fell one over the other upon the floor, the tables, the benches, into
the heavy sleep of riot, Graul suddenly rose from amidst the huddled
bodies, and then, silently as ghouls from a burial-ground, her sisters
emerged also from their resting-places beside the sleepers. The dying
light of the fire contended but feebly with the livid rays of the moon,
and played fantastically over the gleaming robes of the tymbesteres.
They stood erect for a moment, listening, Graul with her finger