"God rest his soul!" he answered, in a low voice. "I owe it to his strong arm and ready wit, as he parried with his mace the blow De Breauté aimed at me, that I am here to-night with thee."
Ralph only waited to see the ladies safely bestowed in the worthy burgess's abode ere he hurried back again to the castle. There was no rest for him that night. Not the least onerous part of a commander's duty in those rough times was to restore order and discipline among his men after the capture of a fortress which had held out against them. It was a melancholy sight to the young knight this sacking and firing of his ancestral castle, the home of his boyhood. It stood there with ruined walls and a huge rift in the side of the great keep like a lightning-stricken oak.
And morning light brought more work. Hubert de Burgh, the king's justiciary, opened a court of justice in his sovereign's name, and before it were brought William de Breauté and eighty of his men.
Late in the afternoon Beatrice Mertoun, devoured with curiosity as to what was happening, and chafing at her restraint in Master Gilbert's house, persuaded one of Lady Margaret's women to come with her towards the castle, intending, under cover of the twilight, to secure such of their possessions as the fire and the plunderers should have spared. But they returned quicker than they went, and empty-handed, driven back by horror; for in the bailey yard they came suddenly upon a rude gallows on which, grim and stark in the dim twilight, hung William de Breauté and seventy-three of his men.
CHAPTER XXIII.
A TÊTE-À-TÊTE RIDE TO ELSTOW ABBEY.
Contrary to his dream and to the gloomy forebodings which he had been hugging to himself after the manner of certain dismal natures which delight to make themselves miserable, William de Beauchamp, as we have seen, escaped unscathed from the assaults on the castle. But lest his melancholy should lack food, as it were, fate had another blow in store for him. No sooner had the castle of Bedford been captured than the royal mandate went forth that it should be destroyed.
Henry III., young though he was, was too well aware of the difficulties which his father had experienced with his barons not to be convinced that his best policy lay in curbing their power. Now the chief strength of a medieval noble lay in his castle. In the taking of Bedford an excellent opportunity seemed ready to Henry's hand for getting rid of one of the most important and substantial fortresses in his kingdom.
He was, moreover, completely in his rights in so doing. King John had granted the castle to Fulke de Breauté as a reward for his services, more especially in turning out the De Beauchamps. But now that De Breauté had rebelled against John's successor, deprivation brought the castle once more into royal hands. What came absolutely to the king, the king could destroy.
This determination was a severe blow to William de Beauchamp. He was grievously hurt when he learned that the destruction of his ancestral home was definitely settled, but he was unable to take any steps to preserve it. It was, however, intimated to him that the site of the castle would be granted to him, together with certain of the lands and manors thereunto appertaining, after the fortress itself had been pulled down. No occupier or owner of a house could then proceed to fortify or crenellate--that is, erect defensive parapets--without the royal license; and William de Beauchamp was informed that though he might build within the castle precincts as suitable a dwelling as he pleased, on no account would such permission be granted.