Then the furious friar began to curse them, hurling at them the anathemas of the Church, till at length Dick called to him to begone or he would send an arrow to help him on the road.
So they went, and presently the sun sank.
“Now let us beware,” said Dick. “The moon is near her full and will rise soon. They’ll attack between times when we cannot see to shoot.”
“Ay,” answered Hugh, “moreover, now this gateway is no place for us. Of arrows there are few left, nor could we see to use them in the dark. The stones too are all spent and therefore they can bridge the moat and batter down the doors unharmed.”
“What then?” asked Dick. “As we cannot fly, where shall we die?”
“On the roof of the old tower, I think, whence we can hurl ourselves at last and so perhaps escape being taken alive, and torment. Look you, Dick, that tower is mounted by three straight flights of steps. The first two of these we’ll hold with such arrows as remain to us—there are three and twenty, as I think—and the last with axe and sword. Listen! They come! Take a brand from the hall hearth and let us go light the flambeaux.”
So they went and set fire to the great torches of wood and tallow that were set in their iron holders to light the steps of the tower. Ere the last of them was burning they heard their enemies ravening without.
“Listen!” said Hugh as they descended to the head of the first flight of stairs. “They are across the moat.”
As he spoke the massive doors crashed in beneath the blows of a baulk of timber.
“Now,” said Hugh, as they strung their bows, “six arrows apiece here, if we can get off so many, and the odd eleven at our next stand. Ah, they come.”