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Page 4
"Betray thee! Never! Why, good fellow, dost not know that the
Chadgroves never betray those who trust in them? Hence sometimes
has trouble come upon them. But before we talk, let me get thee
food. Methinks thou art well-nigh starved."
"Food! food! Ah, if thou wouldst give me that, young master, I
would bless thee forever! I have well-nigh perished with hunger and
thirst. Heaven be thanked that I have tasted water once again!"
"Come hither," said Bertram cautiously. "First close this narrow
doorway, the secret of which thou must teach me in return for what
I will do for thee, and then I will take thee to another chamber,
where our voices will not disturb my brothers, and we can talk, and
thou canst eat at ease. I must know thy story, and I pledge myself
to help thee. Show me now the trick of this door. I swear I will
make no treacherous use of the secret."
"I will trust thee, young sir. I must needs do so, for without
human help I must surely die.
"Seest thou this bunch of grapes so cunningly carved here? This
middle grape of the cluster will turn round in the fingers that
know how to find and grasp it, and so turning and turning slowly,
unlooses a bolt within--here--and so the whole woodwork swings out
upon hinges and reveals the doorway. Where that doorway leads I
will show thee anon, if thou wouldst know the trick of the secret
chamber at Chad that all men have now forgotten. It may be that it
will some day shelter thee or thine, for thou hast enemies abroad,
even as I have."
Bertram was intensely interested as he examined and mastered the
simple yet clever contrivance of this masked door; but quickly
remembering the starved condition of his companion, he led him
cautiously into an adjoining room, where were a table and some
scant furniture, and gliding down the staircase and along dim
corridors just made visible by the reflected radiance of the moon,
he reached the buttery, and armed himself with a venison pasty, a
loaf of bread, and a bottle of wine. Hurrying back with these, he
soon had the satisfaction to see the stranger fall upon them with
the keen relish of a man who has fasted to the last limits of
endurance; and only after he had seen that the keen edge of his
hunger had been satisfied did he try to learn more of him and his
concerns.
"Now tell me, my good friend, who and what thou art," said the boy,
"and how comes it that thou seekest shelter here, and that thou
knowest more of Chad than we its owners do. That is the thing which
has been perplexing me this long while. I would fain hear from thy
story how it comes about."
"That is soon told, young sir. Thou dost not, probably, remember
the name of Warbel as that of some of the retainers of thy
grandsire, but--"
"I have heard the name," said the boy. "I have heard my father
speak of them. But I knew not that there were any of that name now
living."
"I am a Warbel--I trow the last of my race. I was born beyond the
seas; but I was early brought to England, and I heard munch of the
strife that encompassed Chad, because my father and grandfather
both knew the place well, and would fain have gone back and lived
in the old country had not fortune otherwise decreed it. To make a
long story short, they never returned to the place. But when I was
grown to man's estate, I was offered a post in the household of the
Lord of Mortimer, and as it was the best thing that had fallen in
my way, I accepted it very gladly; for I knew that name, too, and I
knew naught against the haughty lord, albeit my father and
grandsire had not loved the lords of that name who lived before
him.
"For many years I have been in his service, and for a while all
went well with me. I was made one of his gentlemen, and he seemed
to favour me. But of late there has been a change towards me--I
know not how or why. I have offended him without intending it, and
he has sometimes provoked me almost beyond endurance by his proud
insolence. But that I might have borne, for he was my master, had
it not been for the insolence and insults I had to bear from others
amongst his servants, and from one youth in particular, who seemed
to me to be trying to oust me from my place, and to get himself the
foremost place in his master's favour. That made my hot blood boil
again and again, until at last the thing I believe they had long
planned happened, and I had to fly for my life."
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