Never was there an apartment more desolate.  Chateau Norbelle was built more to be defended than to be inhabited, and the rooms were rather so much inclosed space than places intended for comfort.  The walls were of unhewn stone, and, as well as the roof, thickly tapestried with cobwebs,—­the narrow loophole which admitted light was unglazed,—­and there was nothing in the whole chamber that could be called furniture, save the two rude pallets which served the Knight and Squire for beds, and a chest which had been forced open and rifled by the mutineers.  They had carried off Eustace’s beloved books, to burn them in the court as instruments of sorcery, and a few garments it had likewise contained lay scattered about the room.  Gaston hastened to the side of his beloved Knight, almost dreading, from his silence and stillness, to find him expiring.  But he was only faint and exhausted, and when Gaston raised him, and began to examine his wounds, he looked up, saying, “Thanks, thanks, kind Gaston! but waste not your time here.  The Castle! the Castle!”

“What care I for the Castle compared to your life!” said Gaston.

“For my honour and your own,” said Eustace, fixing his eyes on his Squire’s face.  “Gaston, I fear you,” he added, stretching out his hand and grasping that of d’Aubricour; “if you survive, you will forget the duty you owe the King, for the purpose of avenging me upon Clarenham.  If ever you have loved me, Gaston, give me your solemn promise that this shall not be.”

“It was the purpose for which I should have lived,” said Gaston.

“You resign it?” said Eustace, still retaining his hold of his hand.  “You touch not one of my wounds till you have given me your oath.”

“I swear it, then,” said Gaston, “since you will ever have your own way, and I do it the rather that Messire Oliver de Clisson will probably save me the pain of keeping the pledge.”

“You have taken all measures for defence?”

“Yes.  The men-at-arms, such as are left, may be trusted, and have all taken an oath to stand by us, which I do not think they will readily break.  The rest either made off with the baggage-mules, or were slain when we broke in to your rescue, or are shut up with Le Borgne Basque in Montfort’s tower.  I have sent the men to their posts, put them under Silverlock’s orders, and told him to come to me for directions.”

Eustace at last resigned himself into the Squire’s hands.  A broken arm, a ghastly-looking cut on the head, and a deep thrust with a poniard in the breast, seemed the most serious of the injuries he had received; but there were numerous lesser gashes and stabs which had occasioned a great effusion of blood, and he had been considerably bruised by his fall.

Gaston could attempt nothing but applying some ointment, sold by a Jew at Bordeaux as an infallible cure for all wounds and bruises; and, having done all he could for the comfort of his patient, quitted him to attend to the defence of the Castle.