They were greeted by the barking of five or six dogs, and this brought the widow hurrying out accompanied by a pretty girl of about seventeen whom she introduced as her granddaughter Hazel. Though she must have been at least sixty by then, the widow Gibberty was still a strikingly handsome woman--tall, imposing-looking, and with hair that must once have had as many shades of red and brown as a bed of wallflowers smouldering in the sun. Then a couple of men came up and led away the horses, and the travellers were taken up to their rooms. As befitted the son of the High Seneschal, the one given to Ranulph was evidently the best. It was large and beautifully proportioned, and in spite of its homely chintzes and the plain furniture of a farm-house, in spite even of the dried rushes laid on the floor instead of a carpet, it bore unmistakable traces of the ancient magnificence when the house had belonged to nobles instead of farmers. For instance, the ceiling was a fine specimen of the flat enamelled ceilings that belonged to the Duke Aubrey period in domestic architecture. There was just such a ceiling in Dame Marigold's bedroom in Lud. She had stared up at it when in travail with Ranulph--just as all the mothers of the Chanticleers had done in the same circumstances--and its colours and pattern had become inextricably confused with her pain and delirium. Endymion Leer was put next to Ranulph, and Luke was given a large pleasant room in the attic. Ranulph was not in the least tired by his long ride, he said. His cheeks were flushed, his eyes bright, and when the widow had left him alone with Luke, he gave two or three skips of glee, and cried, "I do love this place, Luke." At six o'clock a loud bell was rung outside the house, presumably to summon the labourers to supper; and, as the widow had told them it would be in the kitchen, Ranulph and Luke, both feeling very hungry, went hurrying down. It was an enormous kitchen, running the whole length of the house; in the olden days it had been the banqueting hall. It was solidly stone-vaulted, and the great chimney place was also of stone, and decorated in high relief with the skulls and flowers and arabesques of leaves ubiquitous in the art of Dorimare. It was flanked by giant fire-dogs of copper. The floor was tiled with a mosaic of brown and red and grey-blue flag-stones. Down the centre of the room ran a long narrow table laid with pewter plates and mugs, for the labourers and maid servants who came flocking in, their faces shining from recent soap and scrubbing, and stood about in groups at the lower end of the room, grinning and bashful from the presence of company. According to the good old yeoman custom they had their meals with their masters.