"Geoffrey, my son," quoth his mother, "when thou dost attain the age of sixteen it is thy father's purpose to entrust thee with the care of this castle during his sojournings overseas. When that time cometh I shall willingly give place to thee in the matter, but so long as my lord thinketh fit to make me châtelaine of Warblington I, and I only, must have the ordering o' it."
The Lady Bertha was not slow to act on hearing the good tidings that were now brought to her. In a few minutes the castle was in a state of bustle. The nineteen men-at-arms donned their plates and headpieces, and stood to their arms, ready to prove to the Lord of Warblington that they kept good watch and ward; the two score archers, putting on their quilted coats and iron caps, in addition to their everyday dress, rushed hither and thither, gathering evergreens, heaping piles of faggots in the centre of the courtyard, and bedecking the gateway with the arms and pennons of bygone days. Old Giles, the cellarer, hied him to his subterranean retreat, there to broach casks of the best vintages that Gascony and Burgundy could produce, while the kitchen staff were busy with two whole oxen.
Then from the adjacent church tower the bells rang out a merry peal. Almost at the first note the toilers in the fields dropped their hoes and unyoked the horses from the ploughs. They knew the meaning of the peal; to them it meant, as it did on each and every occasion that Sir Oliver returned in safety from the troublous Duchy of Normandy, that the day was to be given up to feasting and merrymaking.
In the thatch-roofed houses of the little hamlet housewives left their hearths, tarrying only to thrust a bough from their upper windows as a sign of welcome, and trooped towards the castle to share with their husbands the joys of their feudal lord's homecoming.
And now from the summit of the keep a keen-eyed sentinel espied the bluff, black bows of the Grâce à Dieu, as, labouring slowly under oars, she crept up the tedious Emsworth channel with the young flood-tide.
The gunners, with port fires lighted and linstocks ready to hand, were clustering round their cumbersome, iron-hooped bombards, gazing the while towards the steadily-approaching vessel. The minstrels, with harp, pipe, and lute, foregathered on the green within the outer bailey, while the Lady Bertha—who, in order to show that she held the castle, refrained from leaving the shelter of the battlements—awaited her husband at the barbican.
Everything was ready for Sir Oliver Lysle's welcome home.
So intent upon the approach of the expected vessel were the crowds that thronged the castle that none perceived a horseman riding from the direction of the city of Chichester. In hot haste, he spared not spur, and, scorning to keep to the road that led from the highway to the castle, he urged his steed across the newly-ploughed fields, while a bowshot in the rear a group of mounted men-at-arms followed at a more leisurely pace.
Skirting the moat, he gained the barbican, then, drawing in his horse, he looked, with an expression of mingled anger and surprise, upon the preparations of welcome.
The newcomer was attired in a blue doublet, amber cloak with fur trimmings, slashed trunks, and long pointed buskins of undressed leather, while from elbow to wrist his arms were swathed in black cloth. That he had ridden far and fast was evident by the exhausted state of his steed and the numerous splashes of mud and chalk that clung tenaciously to man and beast. By his left side he wore a long, straight sword, with a plain cross-hilt and a black leather scabbard, while from the right side of his belt hung a short dagger and a large leather wallet.