"Who calls me?" demanded Mounchensey, pressing through the throng in the direction of the outcries.
"I, your humble follower, Dick Taverner," roared the apprentice; "I am in the clutches of the devil, and I pray you release me."
"Ha! what is this?" cried Sir Jocelyn. "Set him free, at once, Sir Giles, I command you."
"What, if I refuse?" rejoined the other.
"Then I will instantly enforce compliance," thundered Mounchensey.
"If I release him it is because I must defend myself and punish your insolence," cried Sir Giles. And as he spoke, he thrust back the apprentice with such force that he would have fallen to the ground if he had not dropped into the arms of his kneeling mistress.
"Now, Sir Jocelyn," continued Sir Giles, fiercely; "you shall answer for this interference"—
"Hold!" interposed the authoritative voice of Prince Charles; "we must have no unseemly brawls here. To your places at once in the procession, Sir Knights. We are about to set forward to the tilt-yard."
With this, he gave the word to move on, and all further sound of disturbance was drowned by the trampling of steeds and the bruit of the kettle-drums, cornets, and trumpets.
Nowise disheartened by what had occurred, Dick Taverner would have followed with the stream, and carried his mistress and her grandsire along with him; but the former had been so much terrified by what had occurred, that dreading lest her lover's imprudence should get him into further scrapes, she positively refused to proceed any further.