Before the inn, from which floated the royal standard, they drew up, and the leader, an elderly Knight of heavy countenance and rotund frame who carried his visor up, dismounted, and, saluting Sir Aymer de Lacy, whose handsome dress evidenced his condition and rank, demanded instant audience with the King. "His Majesty has but lately returned from Mass," said De Lacy; "but if your business be of immediate importance, I will announce you." The other laughed swaggeringly. "I am Sir Thomas Mitten, Sheriff of Shropshire," he said; "and methinks my business is of most immediate importance, good sir, seeing that I bring with me the traitor, Henry Stafford." "St. Denis! Buckingham a prisoner!" De Lacy exclaimed. "Yonder--among my men. Think you not I shall be welcome?" For answer, De Lacy turned on his heel, and, leaving the Sheriff to find his way to the King the best he could, strode over to the horsemen. Motioning them peremptorily aside, he extended his hand to the tall, ruddy-haired man in the stained and torn velvet. "Believe me, Stafford," he said, "it is a sad day to me that sees you here. I hoped you had escaped." A spasm of anger swept over the Duke's face; then he smiled and seizing De Lacy's fingers gripped them hard. "But for treachery and ingratitude baser than Hell's deepest damned you would not see me here," he said. "And it is a brave and noble heart that beneath the Plantagenet's very eye dares show open friendship for the traitor Buckingham. God knows it is sweet after my life lately; yet be advised, De Lacy, it is dangerous to your standing and, mayhap, your liberty as well; best pass me by on the other side." Aymer made a gesture of dissent. "The King trusts me," he said. "He will not doubt my faith." Stafford laughed sarcastically. "Pardieu! has the Devil turned saint that Gloucester has come to trust a mortal man! At least, I shall soon see if it has changed his fierce spirit, for here is Ratcliffe to lead me to the Presence. . . Does our Cousin of England desire our company, Sir Richard? If so, we are quite ready to embrace him." But Ratcliffe was not one to do his present duty with levity on his tongue, and he bowed with stiff formality. "Will you come with me, my lord?" he said. "_Au revoir_, De Lacy," smiled the Duke. "Now, to brave the Boar in his lair and see him show his tusks." And with an air of easy indifference, this man, for whom the world had held such vast possibilities if he had but known how to attain them, went to meet his doom. For that his life was forfeited Stafford well knew; he had been taken in arms against the King and death would be his portion. Yet the judgment came with a stern swiftness that startled the entire Court; and within the very hour that Shropshire's Sheriff entered Salisbury, was the scaffold for the execution being put in place in the courtyard of the inn.