CHAPTER XXI.
Crooked-hold-him-fast—Making a Lantern of Burnstower Castle.
Assueton had no sooner witnessed the prostration of Master Daniel Throckle than he hastened round to the door of the keep; and, having noted the part of the building where the cellar lay, he slipped down a stair, and, groping along a passage, was soon led to it by the light of the lamp. He entered hastily, and, unbinding the belt from the drunken beast’s body, made himself master of the keys. He then seized the lamp, stole silently out by the door, and, taking the directions Throckle had so gratuitously given him, explored a passage at the end of which he found a stair leading upwards. Beneath it was the strongly-barred door of a vault. Having singled out the key called Crooked-hold-him-fast, he applied it to the door, and found it answer perfectly to the lock. He turned the bolt, and, to his no small delight his lamp showed him his esquire Roger Riddel and Robert Lindsay, both sound asleep on separate heaps of straw. He gently waked first one, and then the other; and, laying his finger on his lips, he cautioned them to be perfectly silent. The poor fellows were so confounded by their unexpected deliverance, that they rubbed their eyes, and could hardly believe that they were really awake.
“Bestir thee, but not a word,” said the knight to them; “the Castle is all our own. There are but two men within the walls. One I have left in a cellar, senseless as a hog, rucking and wallowing in his ale; from him we have nothing to fear, but the other yet standeth sentinel at the outward gate. So we must approach him cautiously; and, when I whistle, pounce on him like falcons. But there is yet a woman in the place, whom we must first secure, to prevent all chance of alarm.”
“Yea,” said Roger Riddel gravely, “woman’s tongue be’s a wicked weapon.”
The knight and his followers hastened to find out the kitchen, and, having peeped in, they descried Betty Burrel either asleep or pretending to be so; and, remarking that the windows were strongly barred, so that she could not escape that way, they gently shut the door, and turned the key in the lock.
They now ascended the stair, and having set down the lamp, Assueton, to guard against all possibility of accident, took the [[161]]large key from the door of the keep, as they passed out. They then stole towards the gateway, where, after prying about for some time, they discovered the watchful warder of the garrison, lying within a doorway, sound asleep, on the steps of the stair leading up to a barbican that overlooked the gate. Assueton immediately sprang on him, and threw the blanket over his head; and, having taken the keys of the gate from him, they muffled him so completely up as to stop his utterance, and, crossing his arms behind his back, bound all tightly together with Master Throckle’s leathern belt. They then hoisted the knave on the broad back of Roger Riddel, who marched merrily away with his burden, and deposited him in the vault, on the very straw from which he had himself so lately risen. Proceeding next to the cellar, they lifted up the drunken jailor, who, being perfectly senseless, had run no small risk of being drowned externally, as well as internally, by a flood of ale; and, having carried him also to the vault, and put him among the straw that had been Robert Lindsay’s bed, they turned Crooked-hold-him fast upon both of them.
Lighting another lamp, which they had found extinguished, the two squires then went to the stables to look for horses. Meanwhile Assueton ascended the stairs alone, to discover the ladies’ chamber of which Throckle had spoken, and by attending to the description the jailor had given, soon discovered it. He tapped gently at the door;—a deep sigh came from within;—he tapped again.
“Who knocks there at this hour?” said a female voice.