"Nay," replied the seneschal. "That I will have lowered, but to what purpose?"
"Hast ever heard how the blessed St. Paul left the city of Damascus? I pray thee lower ropes from the battlements if naught else will serve, and I'll warrant that this night we'll slumber quietly within the walls of Taillemartel."
To this suggestion there was no verbal response, but almost immediately the iron chains of the drawbridge creaked and clanked as the ponderous wooden structure fell slowly on its hinges.
Meanwhile the two archers had tethered the horses of the party in a meadow hard by the moat. This done, Geoffrey and his companions crossed the drawbridge, to find three stout, noosed ropes dangling from the almost invisible heights above.
Spinning round and round like a joint on a jack, Geoffrey was drawn up, and in this somewhat undignified manner he made his entry into his father's Norman home.
Oswald and Gripwell followed, the ropes being again lowered for the two archers, and soon the travellers found themselves standing on the battlements surrounded by the eighty men-at-arms and archers comprising the garrison of Taillemartel, but it was not until the letter bearing the Lady Bertha's signature and the seal of Warblington was produced and read that the seneschal led the round of cheering that greeted Sir Oliver's son.
Bertrand de Vaux was a short, broad-shouldered, bull-necked Norman, of about forty years of age. Muscular strength was evinced by his frame, while his deep-set eyes and heavy square-cut chin denoted resolution and determination akin to obstinacy.
He was soberly attired in a close-fitting suit of green cloth slashed with red, while a silver belt, ornamented with the arms of the Lysles, encircled his waist. On his head he wore a velvet cap of maintenance ornamented by a silver clasp, also stamped with the turbot and the stars, while his feet were encased in untanned leather shoes, the toes of which terminated in long points that for convenience' sake were turned upwards and fastened to the wearer's calves by means of silver buckles.
"I pray you bear me company to the banqueting-hall," said the seneschal addressing Geoffrey and Oswald. "I doubt not that Taillemartel can still provide a repast fitting for Sir Oliver's son, e'en though Sir Oliver himself be not here to have the ordering of it."
So saying, he led the way to the hall where the men-servants had already prepared a plentiful repast of cold venison, pheasants, long rolls of bread, and a copious supply of mead and wine.