"Ha!" cried Roland, "old Baron Hugo drank too deeply last night to be so
early astir."
He was speaking aloud now.
"Take warning from that, my lads, and never allow wine to interfere with
business. Follow me, but cautiously, one after the other in single file,
and look to your footing. 'Tis perilous steep between here and the
gate;" and, indeed, so they found it, but all reached the level
forecourt in safety, and so through the open portal.
"Close and bar those gates," was the next command, instantly obeyed.
Down the stone steps of the Castle, puffing and grunting, came a
gigantic, obese individual, his face bloated with excess, his eyes
bleary with the lees of too much wine. He was struggling into his
doublet, assisted by a terrified old valet, and was swearing most
deplorably. Seeing the crowd at the gate, and half-blindly mistaking
them for his own men, he roared:
"What do you there, you hounds? To the river, every man of you, and
curse your leprous, indolent souls! Why in the fiend's name--" But here
he came to an abrupt stop on the lowest step, the sting of a sword's
point at his throat, and now, out of breath, his purple face became
mottled.
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