“Nay,” answered Beltane, “be comforted.  Answer as I shall direct and fear ye nothing.  Come your ways.”

Now when Roger turned and would have followed, Giles plucked him by the arm: 

“Roger,” quoth he, “Sir Robert will demand speech of Gui of Allerdale, mark ye that, my Rogerkin.  Nor will he speak to any but Sir Gui—­for a great lord and proud is Robert of Hurstmanswyke.  Ha, what think ye, Roger?”

“I think perchance he must go dumb then—­come, let us follow.”

“Nay, but speak he must—­since he may tell us much, aye, and speak he shall.  So come, my Rogerkin, hither with me!”

“With thee, Giles?  And wherefore?”

“A wile, sweet Roger, a notable wile—­a wile of wiles.  Hush! speak not, but come—­for mark this: 

  “In faith a cunning man is Giles
   In counsel sage and full of wiles!”

“So come, Rogerkin!” So saying, he gripped stout Roger’s arm and plunged into the crowd.

Being come out upon the battlement above the gate, Beltane, with the Reeve beside him, peering down through the dark, beheld beyond the moat, a knight supported by four esquires, and beyond these Beltane counted thirty lances what time the Reeve, steadying his voice, challenged them.

Hereupon the knight spake: 

“Ha! do ye stir at last, dogs!  Open in the Duke’s name—­’tis I, Robert, lord of Hurstmanswyke, with message to the lord Seneschal, Sir Gui, and captives from Bourne!”

Then, grim-smiling in the dusk, Beltane spake:  “Now greeting and fair greeting to thee, my lord, and to thy captives.  Hath Thrasfordham fallen so soon?”

“Thrasfordham, fool! ’tis not yet invested—­these be divers of Benedict’s spies out of Bourne, to grace thy gibbets.  Come, unbar—­down with the drawbridge; open I say—­must I wait thy rogue’s pleasure?”

“Not so, noble lord.  Belsaye this night doth welcome thee with open arms—­and ye be in sooth Sir Robert of Hurstmanswyke.”

“Ha, do ye doubt me, knave?  Dare ye keep me without?  Set wide the gates, and instantly, or I will see thee in a noose hereafter.  Open!  Open!  God’s death! will ye defy me? gate ho!”

So Beltane, smiling yet, descended from the battlement and bade them set wide the gates.  Down creaked drawbridge; bars fell, bolts groaned, the massy gates swung wide—­and Sir Robert and his esquires, with his weary captives stumbling in their jangling chains, and his thirty men-at-arms riding two by two, paced into Belsaye market square; the drawbridge rose, creaking, while gates clashed and bar and chain rattled ominously behind them.  But Sir Robert, nothing heeding, secure in his noble might, scowled about him ’neath lifted vizor, and summoned the Reeve to his stirrup with imperious hand: 

“How now, master Reeve,” quoth he, “I am in haste to be gone:  where tarries Sir Gui?  Have ye not warned him of my coming?  Go, say I crave instant speech with him on matters of state, moreover, say I bring fifty and three for him to hang to-morrow—­go!”