“That trough and pipe Bertram and I fashioned in the blacksmith’s forge with our own hands,” said the boy proudly, “and I trow both are good enow and strong.  Dost know what does the other end of the pipe?  Why, we have inserted it into the great rainwater tank yonder above our heads, which our grandsire contrived, and which is fed from the roofs and battlements of all the towers.  Thou hast heard our father tell how he read of such things in days of old, when men built wondrous palaces, and had hanging gardens, and I know not what beside.  He set the tank up there, and, as thou knowest, it is not now greatly used, albeit there is always water there, and at times men draw it forth.  It may not be the best or purest, but it will serve for washing, and for drinking too were a man in a great strait.  It is all pure and sweet now; for in the thunderstorm three nights since Bertram got up and let off all the stagnant water by the pipe which can be opened below, and the rain soon filled it again, it poured down with such goodwill.  We need not fear that any captive will die of thirst.  He has but to draw this bung and water will pour forth into this trough till he stops it again.  He can pour away the surplus down the pipe with the dust and such like.

“I trow whoever lives up here awhile will have no such bad housing.  And if we but get the place victualled this night, it will be ready for Brother Emmanuel whensoever he may need it.”

Chapter VII:  An Imposing Spectacle.

“To appear at the priory with all our household!  Surely, my husband, that command is something strange?”

Lady Chadgrove raised her eyes anxiously to her lord’s face, to see thereon an answering look of perplexity not untinged by anxiety.  He was perusing a paper held in his hands.

“Such is the missive,” he remarked.  “It was brought by a lay brother but now.  Methinks the fellow is yet in the kitchen.  Our mead is not to be lightly disdained.  I will send young Julian to talk with him, and learn if may be the cause of this strange summons.  I would not willingly give cause of offence to the lord prior; and the money has been paid that was promised, so methinks he means no hurt to me or mine.  But it is not safe to adventure oneself into the lion’s mouth.  I would gladly know what is behind all this.  I am something ill at ease.”

“All the household would mean Brother Emmanuel likewise,” said the lady.  “Perchance it is but a means of drawing him within the toils.”

“It is like enough.  It will be the day on which the week of grace expires.  Would to God I could see my way more clearly!  I am in a great strait betwixt mine own conscience and the authority of the Church.  How can I deliver up a faithful and devoted son of the Church to certain death, when my house is his only refuge and protection?  Yet how may I refuse obedience to my spiritual fathers and superiors, to whom I owe submission in all things, in right of their office, albeit as men I know them to be—­faulty?”.