With an army at their call, it were an easy thing to take a lone man, even though that man were the Devil of Torn.
The King and De Montfort had now crossed the smaller apartment and were within the room where the outlaw stood at bay.
At the far side, the group of royal and noble women stood huddled together, while behind De Montfort and the King pushed twenty gentlemen and as many men-at-arms.
“What dost thou here, Norman of Torn?” cried De Montfort, angrily. “Where be my daughter, Bertrade?”
“I be here, My Lord Earl, to attend to mine own affairs,” replied Norman of Torn, “which be the affair of no other man. As to your daughter: I know nothing of her whereabouts. What should she have to do with the Devil of Torn, My Lord?”
De Montfort turned toward the little gray man.
“He lies,” shouted he. “Her kisses be yet wet upon his lips.”
Norman of Torn looked at the speaker and, beneath the visor that was now partly raised, he saw the features of the man whom, for twenty years, he had called father.
He had never expected love from this hard old man, but treachery and harm from him? No, he could not believe it. One of them must have gone mad. But why Flory’s armor and where was the faithful Flory?
“Father!” he ejaculated, “leadest thou the hated English King against thine own son?”