It was plain that the old man had no small fear of his master, and would gladly be spared this office. Gaston looked round to see that some of his own followers were close behind and on the alert, and then taking Constanza's hand in his, and laying his right hand upon the hilt of his sword, he signed to the seneschal to throw open the massive oaken doors, and walked fearlessly in with Raymond at his side.
They found themselves in the ancient banqueting hall of the fortress -- a long, lofty, rather narrow room, with a heavily-raftered ceiling, two huge fireplaces, one at either end, and a row of very narrow windows cut in the great thickness of the wall occupying almost the whole of one side of the place; whilst a long table was placed against the opposite wall, with benches beside it, and another smaller table was placed upon a small raised dais at the far end of the apartment. On this dais was also set a heavy oaken chair, close beside the glowing hearth; and at this moment it was plain that the occupant of the chair had been disturbed by the commotion from without, and had suddenly risen to his feet, for he stood grasping the oaken arms, his wild gray hair hanging in matted masses about his seamed and wrinkled face, and his hollow eyes, in which a fierce light blazed, turned upon the intruders in a glare of impotent fury.
"Who are ye who thus dare to intrude upon me here? What is all this tumult I hear in mine own halls?
"Seneschal, art thou there? Send hither to me my soldiers; bid them bind these men, and carry them to the dungeons. I will see them there. Ha, ha! I will talk with them there. I will deal with them there. What ho! Send me the jailer and his assistants! Let them light the fires and heat hot the irons. Let them prepare our welcome for guests to Saut. Ha, ha! Ho, ho! These brave gallants shall taste our hospitality. Who brought them in? Where were they found? Methinks they will prove a rich booty. Would that good Peter Sanghurst were here to help me in the task of entertaining these new guests!"
The man was a raving lunatic; that was plain to the most inexperienced eye from the first moment. He knew not his own niece, he knew not the De Brocas brothers, though Raymond's face must have been familiar to him had he been in his right senses. He was still in fancy the undisputed lord of these wide lands, scouring the country for English travellers or prisoners of meaner mould; acting here in Gascony much the same part as the Sanghursts had more cautiously done in England, and as the Barons of both France and England had long done, though their day of irresponsible and autocratic power was well-nigh at an end.
He glared upon the brothers and their attendants with savage fury, still calling out to his men to carry them to the dungeons, still believing them to be a band of travellers taken prisoners by his own orders, raving and raging in his impotent fury till the gust of passion had worn itself out, and in a sullen amaze he sank into his seat, still gazing out from under his shaggy brows at the intruders, but the passion and fury for a moment at an end.
"He will understand better what you say to him now, Sir Knight," whispered the old seneschal, who alone of the men belonging to the Castle dared to enter the hall where their maniac master was. "His mind comes back to him sometimes after he has raved himself quiet. We dread his sullen moods almost more than his wild ones.
"Have a care how you approach him. He is as cunning as a fox, and as crafty as he is cruel. He always has some weapon beneath his robe. Have a care, I say, how you approach him."
Gaston nodded, but he was too fearless by nature to pay much heed to the warning; he felt himself more than a match for that bowed-down old man. Giving Constanza into Raymond's charge, he stepped boldly up to the dais, and doffing his headpiece, addressed himself to his adversary in firm though courteous accents.
"My Lord of Navailles," he said, "I am come to claim mine own. If thou knowest me not, I will tell thee who I am -- Gaston de Brocas, the Lord of Saut in mine own right, and by the mandate of the King which I hold in mine hand. Long hast thou held lands to which thou hadst no right, but the day has come when I claim mine own again, and am prepared to do battle for it to the death. But here is no battle needed. Thine own men have called me lord; they have obeyed the mandate of the King, and have opened their gates to me. I stand here the Lord of Saut. Thy power and thy reign are over for ever. Grossly hast thou abused that power when it was thine. Now, like all tyrants, thou art finding that thy servants fall away in the hour of peril, and that thou, who hast been a cruel master, canst command no service from them in the time of need. I, and I alone, am Lord of Saut. Hast thou aught to say ere thou yieldest dominion to me?"