Sir John smiled.  “Have you found the wings the warder recommended?”

“We shall not require them; the gate is easier entrance than over the walls—­besides being the way naturally intended.  This is not the first time I have forced such a castle and won it by sundown. . .  Giles, we will try the flagons; let the ropes be made ready, and bid the archers stand to their bows.”

Sir John was regarding De Lacy with vexed surprise.

“Flagons!” he broke out.  “Do you think to win the castle by pouring wine on the waters of the moat?”

Aymer laughed.  “It is a trick I learned among the Italians, though they use hollow iron balls.  There were none such at Pontefract, so I substituted flagons; they are filled with powder, the mouth plugged shut save for the fuse, and the whole is wrapped in a bag, also filled with powder.”

“How in the name of St. Luke do you expect to use them?”

“Come,” said De Lacy, and led the way to the edge of the moat.

The squire was there uncoiling a long, stout rope with a broad iron ball at one end.  Fastening the other end to a projection in the barbican, he whirled the weighted one around his head, then suddenly let it fly.  Like a bird it soared over the moat, and crossing back of the right lift-chain swung far down near the water.  With a wide grappling hook he caught it above the ball, and drawing it in tied the two ends together, forming a great loop around the chain where it was fastened to the bridge.

Hitherto there had been no opposition from the castle; but now there was a change.

As Dauvrey whirled another weighted rope behind the left draw-chain, an arrow whistled from the wall and rapped him hard upon the hauberk near the gorget, piercing the outer mail, but being stayed by the inner shirt of Italian steel.  The next instant the shafts came thick and furious, marking De Bury and De Lacy and the squire at every joint and seam of their harness, but without effect.

“By St. Denis, I fancy not those bolts,” exclaimed De Lacy, as a quarrel from an arbalest glanced along his helmet near the eye hole.  “It came from the left gate tower, methought.”

“From the far window,” said De Bury.

“Fetch me a bow,” De Lacy ordered Royk.

Drawing off his right gauntlet he notched the shaft and waited.  Presently a head rose cautiously in the window and the cross-bow was laid upon the ledge.  Instantly De Lacy’s fingers touched his cheek, the string twanged sweetly, and the arrow flashed across and deep into the brain of the arbalestier.

The cry he gave as death gripped him was answered by the splash of his weapon as it sank into the waters of the moat.

“Bravo! my lord!” Raynor exclaimed.  “You are a sight for old eyes.”

“It was a lucky shot,” the Knight replied, handing back the stave.