“Forth of this, my friends. Let the door be secured behind us, so that they cannot break out; and as there is no other, they shall play with their thumbs for an hour while we prepare them a strategy.”
In the pursuit of this piece of wisdom, the four of us slipped into the antechamber, while the foolish old duke, who had appeared utterly to fail under the stress of these affairs, was still using so much querulousness to his trusty gentleman-usher that he did not observe the latest device of his daughter. Thus was he none the wiser for our escape, nor for the project that was presently to be set afoot for his undoing.
In the antechamber were the six soldiers who had been so mishandled by one purposeful man of brawn. They stood in a group, regarding us with unintelligent goatlike eyes. Her ladyship turned upon them, and said scornfully, “Do you go and summon the smiths out of the armoury, you paltry knaves. Send them here with their tools immediately.”
She then commanded the Count of Nullepart, Sir Richard Pendragon, and myself to stand with drawn swords before the door leading to the duke’s apartment, so that neither he nor his councillor should pass out before it was sealed.
“Why, madam, these precautions?” asked the Count of Nullepart.
“It is my intention to draw out every fang that this old bear hath in his chaps,” said the Countess Sylvia.
“How so, and why so, madam? Do you propose to wall up your old father, his lordship’s grace, and do him to death with good Don Paunch, his trusty fat man?”
“You ought to be wise, sir; you ask many questions,” said madam imperiously. “But perhaps it were not amiss if I unfolded my design to my good followers.”
“That is well spoke, thou sweet bud of the rose garden,” said Sir Richard Pendragon. “Let us hear whether thy dear little poll be a proper comrade to thy valiance.”
“Stand you to the door then, friends, and this is my design. While his lordship’s grace is stewing and sweating in durance with that fat fellow, and braying like an old mule for his liberty, I will have every one of his three hundred men-at-arms answer to the roster. I will issue a proclamation, by which they shall learn that in the person of their mistress they have a new master; and each shall take the oath of his fealty in his new service. And I will cause the master armourer and the master treasurer to do the same, for I have to tell you, my friends, that henceforward this castle is to have only one generalissimo.”