r with the same perplexed expression as before.

"This is untoward, Sir Tristram," he said at last. "And I scarce know
in what words to make it clear to you, and to your fair wife, and to Sir
Nigel Loring, and to these other stranger knights. My tongue is a blunt
one, and fitter to shout word of command than to clear up such a matter
as this, of which I can myself understand little. This, however, I know,
that my wife is come of a very sainted race, whom God hath in His
wisdom endowed with wondrous powers, so that Tiphaine Raquenel was known
throughout Brittany ere ever I first saw her at Dinan. Yet these powers
are ever used for good, and they are the gift of God and not of the
devil, which is the difference betwixt white magic and black."

"Perchance it would be as well that we should send for Father Stephen,"
said Sir Tristram.

"It would be best that he should come," cried the Hospitaller.

"And bring with him a flask of holy water," added the knight of Bohemia.

"Not so, gentlemen," answered Sir Bertrand. "It is not needful that this
priest should be called, and it is in my mind that in asking for this ye
cast some slight shadow or slur upon the good name of my wife, as though
it were still doubtful whether her power came to her from above or
below. If ye have indeed such a doubt I pray that you will say so, that
we may discuss the matter in a fitting way."

"For myself," said Sir Nigel, "I have heard such words fall from the
lips of this lady that I am of the opinion that there is no woman,
save only one, who can be in any way compared to her in beauty and in
goodness. Should any gentleman think otherwise, I should deem it great
honor to run a small course with him, or debate the matter in whatever
way might be most pleasing to him."

"Nay, it would ill become me to cast a slur upon a lady who is both
my guest and the wife of my comrade-in-arms," said the Seneschal of
Villefranche. "I have perceived also that on her mantle there is marked
a silver cross, which is surely sign enough that there is nought of evil
in these strange powers which you say that she possesses."

This argument of the seneschal's appealed so powerfully to the Bohemian
and to the Hospitaller that they at once intimated that their objections
had been entirely overcome, while even the Lady Rochefort, who had sat
shivering and crossing herself, ceased to cast glances at the door, and
allowed her fears to turn to curiosity.

"Among the gi