Set we on for Shoreby ! '' CHAPTER II -- `` IN MINE ENEMIES ' HOUSE '' Sir Daniel 's residence in Shoreby was a tall , commodious , plastered mansion , framed in carven oak , and covered by a low-pitched roof of thatch . To the back there stretched a garden , full of fruit-trees , alleys , and thick arbours , and overlooked from the far end by the tower of the abbey church . The house might contain , upon a pinch , the retinue of a greater person than Sir Daniel ; but even now it was filled with hubbub . The court rang with arms and horseshoe-iron ; the kitchens roared with cookery like a bees ' - hive ; minstrels , and the players of instruments , and the cries of tumblers , sounded from the hall . Sir Daniel , in his profusion , in the gaiety and gallantry of his establishment , rivalled with Lord Shoreby , and eclipsed Lord Risingham . All guests were made welcome . Minstrels , tumblers , players of chess , the sellers of relics , medicines , perfumes , and enchantments , and along with these every sort of priest , friar , or pilgrim , were made welcome to the lower table , and slept together in the ample lofts , or on the bare boards of the long dining-hall . On the afternoon following the wreck of the Good Hope , the buttery , the kitchens , the stables , the covered cartshed that surrounded two sides of the court , were all crowded by idle people , partly belonging to Sir Daniel 's establishment , and attired in his livery of murrey and blue , partly nondescript strangers attracted to the town by greed , and received by the knight through policy , and because it was the fashion of the time . The snow , which still fell without interruption , the extreme chill of the air , and the approach of night , combined to keep them under shelter . Wine , ale , and money were all plentiful ; many sprawled gambling in the straw of the barn , many were still drunken from the noontide meal . To the eye of a modern it would have looked like the sack of a city ; to the eye of a contemporary it was like any other rich and noble household at a festive season . Two monks -- a young and an old -- had arrived late , and were now warming themselves at a bonfire in a corner of the shed . A mixed crowd surrounded them -- jugglers , mountebanks , and soldiers ; and with these the elder of the two had soon engaged so brisk a conversation , and exchanged so many loud guffaws and country witticisms , that the group momentarily increased in number . The younger companion , in whom the reader has already recognised Dick Shelton , sat from the first somewhat backward , and gradually drew himself away . He listened , indeed , closely , but he opened not his mouth ; and by the grave expression of his countenance , he made but little account of his companion 's pleasantries . At last his eye , which travelled continually to and fro , and kept a guard upon all the entrances of the house , lit upon a little procession entering by the main gate and crossing the court in an oblique direction . Two ladies , muffled in thick furs , led the way , and were followed by a pair of waiting-women and four stout men-at-arms . The next moment they had disappeared within the house ; and Dick , slipping through the crowd of loiterers in the shed , was already giving hot pursuit . `` The taller of these twain was Lady Brackley , '' he thought ; `` and where Lady Brackley is , Joan will not be far . ''
At the door of the house the four men-at-arms had ceased to follow , and the ladies were now mounting the stairway of polished oak , under no better escort than that of the two XXXXX .
arbours cartshed dining-hall enchantments first fruit-trees loiterers pleasantries tumblers waiting-women