they rang. Now, under the interdict, no bell rang. There were no usual
church services, and everywhere was fasting. A strange England it
seemed.

The king had never gotten on well with his barons, and they hated him.
Nevertheless they would have stood by him if he had been at all just to
them. And surely he needed them to stand by him, for all the world was
against him. The French were eager to fight him, and the Church was
arrayed against him. But all these things only made the king harder and
more unjust to the barons because just now they were the only ones in
his power, and his wicked heart was full of rage. He had hit upon one
means of punishing them which they all could feel,--he struck them
through their wives and children. Some of the barons were obliged to
flee from England for their lives. Many were obliged to give the king
their sons as pledges of their loyalty. In every man's knowledge was
the sad case of one baron who had been obliged to flee with his wife
and son into hiding. The king, through his officers, had pursued them,
ferreted them out of their hiding-place, taken the wife and son
captive, shut them up in prison, and starved them to death. Lord De
Aldithely himself had been obliged to flee, but his son would never be
delivered up peaceably to the king's messengers, for De Aldithely
castle was strong and well defended.

This was the meaning of the arrows shot at the strange boy. The king's
messengers, who were constantly spying on the castle from the wood in
the hope of gaining possession of the person of the young lord by
stratagem, had taken him for Josceline, the young heir of the De
Aldithelys.

And now came a summons for both lads to come to the ladies' bower, for