In a few minutes the entire rear wall of the fort was enveloped in flames that curled up over the ramparts, and Simon Ferdinando, the incendiary, was groping in a subterranean vault. “Make haste,” said a boyishly excited voice. “I am here,” and in a moment Frazer, having been liberated by Simon, had entered the main armory.
The fortress no longer belonged to England.
Frazer glanced about the mess-room with a quick, searching scrutiny. It was half filled with a coarse crew of his own arquebusiers, who, bridling their ribald tongues half mockingly as he entered, awaited his commands. A number of women were cowering in one corner. Before them lay the last of their immediate defenders, lifeless or mortally wounded, Dyonis Harvie prone in the foremost line, his wife, on her knees beside him, imploring him to live.
As Frazer looked at the women he bowed to two, about whom the others were gathered in despair. “The king is come, Mistress Dare, according as he promised years ago. He claims his queen.”
He turned to the soldiers. “Bear these two to the hovel in which Vytal lived. Do with the others as you will. The town is ours.”
CHAPTER V
“Some powers divine, or else infernal, mixed