hereon as I have upon this matter. Did I sin in so slaying
my father's enemy?"

"Nay," said Prior Edward, quietly, "thou didst not sin. It was for
others thou didst fight, my son, and for others it is pardonable to do
battle. Had it been thine own quarrel, it might haply have been more
hard to have answered thee."

Who can gainsay, even in these days of light, the truth of this that the
good priest said to the sick lad so far away in the past?

One day the Earl of Mackworth came to visit Myles. At that time the
young knight was mending, and was sitting propped up with pillows, and
was wrapped in Sir James Lee's cloak, for the day was chilly. After a
little time of talk, a pause of silence fell.

"My Lord," said Myles, suddenly, "dost thou remember one part of a
matter we spoke of when I first came from France?"

The Earl made no pretence of ignorance. "I remember," said he, quietly,
looking straight into the young man's thin white face.

"And have I yet won the right to ask for the Lady Alice de Mowbray to
wife?" said Myles, the red rising faintly to his cheeks.

"Thou hast won it," said the Earl, with a smile.

Myles's eyes shone and his lips trembled with the pang of sudden joy
and triumph, for he was still very weak. "My Lord," said he, presently
"belike thou camest here to see me for this very matter?"

The Earl smiled again without answering, and Myles knew that he had
guessed aright. He reached out one of his weak, pallid hands from
beneath the cloak. The Earl of Mackworth took it with a firm pressure,
then instantly quitting it again, rose, as if ashamed of his emotion,
stamped his feet, as though in pretence of being chilled, and then
crossed the room to where the fire crackled brightly in the great stone
fireplace.

Little else remains to be told; only a few loose strands to tie, and the
story is complete.

Though Lord Falworth was saved from death at the block, though his honor
was cleansed from stain, he was yet as poor and needy as ever. The
King, in spite of all the pressure brought to bear upon him, refused to
restore the estates of Falworth and Easterbridge--the latter of which
had again reverted to the crown upon the death of the Earl of Alban
without issue--upon the grounds that they had been forfeited not because
of the attaint of treason, but because of Lord Falworth having refused
to respond to the citation of the courts. So the business dragged along
for month after month, until in