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baron to bear—it will have a member on the gibbet."
    "I tell you, I—" Hereford stopped suddenly. His color faded slowly to normal as he stood staring into space, and he put a hand up to pull gently on the lobe of one ear. "Tell him instead to stop being foolish and to meet me here after Epiphany. I will have work for him of just the kind he likes. He shall have rich booty and, in addition, will bring honor instead of dishonor to his name."
    "You would not have me set a trap for him, Roger? He is my son too, though you are more dear."
    "Do you think I have changed so much, Mother? Nay, I speak the honest truth. I did not tell you, for it cannot matter to you, but I met with Gaunt and Gloucester when I first came from France and I have large plans." He smiled at her widening eyes. "Do not trouble your head over these things. They are not a woman's affair—at least, not an ordinary woman's," he added, thinking of Elizabeth, "but Walter may well be useful to me and satisfy his craving for power at the same time."

    Lord Hereford's party topped a small rise, and Roger looked with relief at the gray stone towers of Castle Chester. He had been so anxious to make good time that they had ridden far into the night and camped in the open, and Lord Hereford as well as his men was nearly frozen. A raised hand brought Sir Alan of Evesham to his side.
    "Ride ahead and let Lord Chester know we are but a few minutes behind you. If he is not within, you had better ask for the Lady Elizabeth."
    "Yes, my lord. Shall I ask for quarters for the men?"
    "Yes. I will not send them back in this weather." Lord Hereford smiled. "Fair frozen, are you not, Alan?"
    "Ay, my lord. That we are, and not used to it any more neither. But it is good even to be frozen with you in the lead again. I do not say that Lord Radnor was neglectful in guarding your lands, for he was most zealous in keeping them quiet, but I for one am sick of the same dull patrolling, and he is a man of sour temper to work for."
    "Never mind, Alan. You will see hot enough action and in strange places in plenty soon now. I am not given to idleness."
    "That you are not, I warrant my head on it, my lord."
    The Earl of Chester was not at home; he was out hunting, for it was a sport he was violently addicted to and neither cold nor wet could dissuade him from the chase. Elizabeth, greeting Alan with courtesy, for he was wellborn, though a younger son and therefore employed as Hereford's master-at-arms, concealed the mixed emotions his news aroused in her. After making him comfortable with hot wine and a place by the fire in the great hall, she hurried off to arrange for quartering Hereford's men. In these uneasy times, the men-at-arms’ barracks were full.
    Arms and food stores would have to be shifted from the ground floor of the donjon to other places in the keep, the arms to some tower room, the food to sheds in the bailey. The hearth, Elizabeth said, looking with disfavor at the accumulated filth in it, would need to be swept clean at once and a large fire lighted. The banks of the Dee were frozen, but she ordered a group of male serfs out to gather what fresh rushes could be found. Others were to be brought from storage in an outhouse, mixed with dried marjoram and rosemary, and spread on the floor. She sent a page for the head cook and gave orders that another pig was to be slaughtered and another side of venison taken from the salted meats to be added to the dinner meats.
    "First he says he is coming in two weeks and four days later he is here," she grumbled, suppressing a little thrill of excitement. "I swear that he does it to be contrary, give trouble, and catch me unprepared.”
    Having set the servants to work, Elizabeth made her way to the kitchen. “The meats have not been hung and cannot be roasted," she said to the cook a little breathlessly. "You will have to boil them well first to soften them and then bake them on the open coals to give them some taste. Remember to put