a monstrous height

Their contravention of the treaty increased international tensions.

The stone part of the drawbridge with its barbican and the bartizans of the gatehouse are in good repair. […] There was a large hidden trapdoor in the floor of the barbican, which would let them into the moat after all.

The tale of the wildly divergent paths that brought the two Borises to this battle has the flavour of the synopsis for a novel Jeffrey Archer was too ashamed to show his publisher.