Otto of the Silver Hand | Page 5

behind the castle stables
howled dismally in answer. Dong! Dong! - Dong! Dong!
Then would follow a great noise and uproar and hurry in the castle
court-yard below; men shouting and calling to one another, the ringing
of armor, and the clatter of horses' hoofs upon the hard stone. With the
creaking and groaning of the windlass the iron-pointed portcullis would
be slowly raised, and with a clank and rattle and clash of iron chains the
drawbridge would fall crashing. Then over it would thunder horse and
man, clattering away down the winding, stony pathway, until the great
forest would swallow them, and they would be gone.
Then for a while peace would fall upon the castle courtyard, the cock
would crow, the cook would scold a lazy maid, and Gretchen, leaning
out of a window, would sing a snatch of a song, just as though it were a
peaceful farm-house, instead of a den of robbers.
Maybe it would be evening before the men would return once more.
Perhaps one would have a bloody cloth bound about his head, perhaps
one would carry his arm in a sling; perhaps one - maybe more than one
- would be left behind, never to return again, and soon forgotten by all
excepting some poor woman who would weep silently in the loneliness
of her daily work.
Nearly always the adventurers would bring back with them pack-
horses laden with bales of goods. Sometimes, besides these, they would
return with a poor soul, his hands tied behind his back and his feet

beneath the horse's body, his fur cloak and his flat cap wofully awry. A
while he would disappear in some gloomy cell of the dungeon-keep,
until an envoy would come from the town with a fat purse, when his
ransom would be paid, the dungeon would disgorge him, and he would
be allowed to go upon his way again.
One man always rode beside Baron Conrad in his expeditions and
adventures a short, deep-chested, broad-shouldered man, with sinewy
arms so long that when he stood his hands hung nearly to his knees.
His coarse, close-clipped hair came so low upon his brow that only a
strip of forehead showed between it and his bushy, black eyebrows.
One eye was blind; the other twinkled and gleamed like a spark under
the penthouse of his brows. Many folk said that the one-eyed Hans had
drunk beer with the Hill-man, who had given him the strength of ten,
for he could bend an iron spit like a hazel twig, and could lift a barrel of
wine from the floor to his head as easily as though it were a basket of
eggs.
As for the one-eyed Hans he never said that he had not drunk beer with
the Hill-man, for he liked the credit that such reports gave him with the
other folk. And so, like a half savage mastiff, faithful to death to his
master, but to him alone, he went his sullen way and lived his sullen
life within the castle walls, half respected, half feared by the other
inmates, for it was dangerous trifling with the one-eyed Hans.
II.
How the Baron went Forth to Shear.
Baron Conrad and Baroness Matilda sat together at their morning meal
below their raised seats stretched the long, heavy wooden table, loaded
with coarse food - black bread, boiled cabbage, bacon, eggs, a great
chine from a wild boar, sausages, such as we eat nowadays, and flagons
and jars of beer and wine, Along the board sat ranged in the order of
the household the followers and retainers. Four or five slatternly
women and girls served the others as they fed noisily at the table,
moving here and there behind the men with wooden or pewter dishes of

food, now and then laughing at the jests that passed or joining in the
talk. A huge fire blazed and crackled and roared in the great open
fireplace, before which were stretched two fierce, shaggy,
wolfish-looking hounds. Outside, the rain beat upon the roof or ran
trickling from the eaves, and every now and then a chill draught of
wind would breathe through the open windows of the great black
dining-hall and set the fire roaring.
Along the dull-gray wall of stone hung pieces of armor, and swords and
lances, and great branching antlers of the stag. Overhead arched the
rude, heavy, oaken beams, blackened with age and smoke, and
underfoot was a chill pavement of stone.
Upon Baron Conrad's shoulder leaned the pale, slender, yellow- haired
Baroness, the only one in all the world with whom the fierce lord of
Drachenhausen softened to gentleness, the only one upon whom his
savage brows looked kindly, and to whom his harsh voice softened
with love.
The Baroness was talking