of
the knife. But Osberne spake again: "I ask thee, warrior, wilt thou
enter the field that I shall hazel for thee?" Quoth the ruffler, but
in a lower voice: "I cannot fight with a boy; whether I slay him or am
slain I am shamed."

Spake Osberne: "Then depart from the house with as little shame as a
ruffler and a churl may have. But if thou wilt neither of these
things, then it will befal that I shall draw my blade and fall on thee
to slay thee, and make the most of it that here stands by me my man
Stephen, a true and fearless carle, with his whittle bare in his hand.
And this I may well do, whereas, by thine own telling, thou art not in
our house but in thine own."

Hardcastle lifted up his head, for he had hung it down a while, and
said in a hoarse voice: "Hazel the field for me then, and I will go
therein with thee and slay thee." "That may well be," said Osberne,
"--yet it may not be." Then he bade Stephen to go hazel the field in
the flat meadows toward the river: and therewith he bethought him of
his friend on the further side of the water, and how it might well be
that he should never see her again, but lie slain on the meadow of
Wethermel; and he wondered if tidings of the battle would go across
the water and come unto her. But amidst his musings the harsh voice of
Hardcastle reached his ears: he turned around with a start and heard
how the ruffler said to him: "Let me see the sword, lad, wherewith
thou wilt fight me." Osberne took the sheathed blade from his girdle
and handed it to Hardcastle without a word, and the warrior fell at
once to handling the peace-strings, but Osberne cried out: "Nay,
warrior, meddle not with the peace-strings, for who knoweth what
scathe may come of the baring of the blade within doors?" "Well,
well," said Hardcastle, "but the blade must be out presently, and what
harm if it be now?" Yet he took his hand from the weapon, and laid it
on the board before him.

Osberne looked about him and saw that they two were alone in the hall
now, for the others had gone down to look on the hazelling. So he
spake quietly and said: "Warrior, is it not so, that thou hast in
thine heart some foreboding of what shall befal?" Hardcastle answered
nought, and Osberne went on: "I see that so it is, and meseems it were
better for thee if this battle were unfought. Lo now, shall we not
make peace in such wise that thou abide here this day in all honour
holden, and in honour depart tomorrow morn, led out