"What--on that poor twisted creature?"

"I tell you that he has flouted me!"

"But how?"

"I should have thought that a true cavalier would have flown to my aid,
withouten all these questions. But I will tell you, since I needs must.
Know then that he was one of those who came around me and professed to
be my own. Then, merely because he thought that there were others who
were as dear to me as himself he left me, and now he pays court to Maude
Twynham, the little freckle-faced hussy in his village."

"But how has this hurt you, since he was no man of thine?"

"He was one of my men, was he not? And he has made game of me to his
wench. He has told her things about me. He has made me foolish in her
eyes. Yes, yes, I can read it in her saffron face and in her watery eyes
when we meet at the church door on Sundays. She smiles--yes, smiles at
me! Nigel, go to him! Do not slay him, nor even wound him, but lay his
face open with thy riding-whip, and then come back to me and tell me how
I can serve you."

Nigel's face was haggard with the strife within, for desire ran hot in
every vein, and yet reason shrank with horror. "By Saint Paul! Edith,"
he cried, "I see no honor nor advancement of any sort in this thing
which you have asked me to do. Is it for me to strike one who is no
better than a cripple? For my manhood I could not do such a deed, and I
pray you, dear lady, that you will set me some other task."

Her eyes flashed at him in contempt. "And you are a man-at-arms!" she
cried, laughing in bitter scorn. "You are afraid of a little man who can
scarce walk. Yes, yes, say what you will, I shall ever believe that you
have heard of his skill at fence and of his great spirit, and that your
heart has failed you! You are right, Nigel. He is indeed a perilous man.
Had you done what I asked he would have slain you, and so you have shown
your wisdom."

Nigel flushed and winced under the words, but he said no more, for his
mind was fighting hard within him, striving to keep that high image
of woman which seemed for a moment to totter on the edge of a fall.
Together in silence, side by side, the little man and the stately woman,
the yellow charger and the white jennet, passed up the sandy winding
track with the gorse and the bracken head-high on either side. Soon a
path branched off through a gateway marked with the boar-heads of the
Buttesthorns, and there was the low widespread house heavily timbered,
loud with the barking