The feast, spread on oaken tables covered with scarlet cloths, blazed with the sheen of precious candelabra, cups inlaid with rubies, and silver figures trimmed with posies of flowers, aromatic herbs and green boughs from the wood, the walls hung with damascened draperies and a fair Moorish carpet on the floor. The fish, flesh, and fowl served in heavy silver platters were offered entire to each guest, who with his dagger cut his own portion, drinking from silver goblets placed at his side. At the conclusion of the banquet, to the blare of trumpets, King Don Sancho rose to lead his mother to her retiring room, with the same state as she had entered. Already the kings of Navarre and Aragon had passed on, and the Conde de Castile was preparing to follow when an armed hand was placed on his shoulder and a voice uttered in his ear: “You are my prisoner.” “Your prisoner?” cried he, looking round to behold a circle of armed men, who had silently gathered behind his chair as he was in the act of making obeisance to the queen, “by my troth! this is an idle jest. You have mistaken your man, my masters. Look elsewhere.” “Not at all,” cried Queen Doña Teresa, disengaging her hand from that of the king, the old malignant smile glittering in her black eyes. “Did you think, Sir Conde, we were as green as you, who come unarmed a second time among your foes? The bird that had flown is recaptured! Ha! ha!” and she gave a bitter laugh. “I think I can prophesy you will not escape this time! The dungeons of Leon are better guarded than those of Narbonne!” “Queen Doña Teresa,” was his answer, his arms already bound by fetters, “_I_ take no shame for _my_ lack of suspicion. Rather is it for _you_, so royally born, to blush at such baseness. _You_,” and, spite of himself, his eyes flamed with rage as he realised that he had again fallen into the power of his remorseless kinsfolk, “you are a disgrace to the royal lineage you represent. See, even the king, your son, casts down his eyes. Don Sancho is ashamed of his mother!” Stung by his reproaches the queen raised her hand as a signal to the guards to bear him away. “What manner of man is this?” she said, turning to the king, who, though he had joined in the conspiracy, now stood irresolute and pale, a silent witness to his mother’s treachery. “He dares to jeer at me with the chains about his neck. But a long life passed in a Gothic dungeon will bring down his pride. Fear not, my son, what can he do? When the half of his kingdom is in your hands you will thank me.” “But our kinswoman the Infanta will offer a large ransom. Can you refuse _her_?” “Refuse!” retorted the queen, her tall figure drawn up to its full height; “there is no treasure in the world that shall buy off the Conde de Castila. His death alone will satisfy me.” And with a menacing gesture in the direction by which he had disappeared, she swept out of the hall as she had come, followed by her retinue. CHAPTER XXV