Earthed! Ay, but there
is not a dog among them fit to dig me out."

Sir Oliver had come to himself, and now scrambled to his feet.

"Alack, Sir Daniel!" he moaned, "y' have sworn a dread oath; y' are
doomed to the end of time."

"Ay," returned the knight, "I have sworn an oath, indeed, thou
chucklehead; but thyself shalt swear a greater. It shall be on the
blessed cross of Holywood. Look to it; get the words ready. It shall be
sworn to-night."

"Now, may Heaven lighten you!" replied the priest; "may Heaven incline
your heart from this iniquity!"

"Look you, my good father," said Sir Daniel, "if y' are for piety, I say
no more; ye begin late, that is all. But if y' are in any sense bent
upon wisdom, hear me. This lad beginneth to irk me like a wasp. I have a
need for him, for I would sell his marriage. But I tell you, in all
plainness, if that he continue to weary me he shall go join his father.
I give orders now to change him to the chamber above the chapel. If that
ye can swear your innocency with a good solid oath and an assured
countenance, it is well; the lad will be at peace a little, and I will
spare him. If that ye stammer or blench, or anyways boggle at the
swearing, he will not believe you; and, by the mass, he shall die. There
is for your thinking on."

"The chamber above the chapel!" gasped the priest.

"That same," replied the knight. "So if ye desire to save him, save him;
and if ye desire not, prithee, go to, and let me be at peace! For an I
had been a hasty man I would already have put my sword through you, for
your intolerable cowardice and folly. Have ye chosen? Say!"

"I have chosen," said the priest. "Heaven pardon me, I will do evil for
good. I will swear for the lad's sake."

"So it is best!" said Sir Daniel. "Send for him, then, speedily. Ye
shall see him alone. Yet I shall have an eye on you. I shall be here in
the panel room."

The knight raised the arras and let it fall again behind him. There was
the sound of a spring opening; then followed the creaking of trod
stairs.

Sir Oliver, left alone, cast a timorous glance upward at the
arras-covered wall, and crossed himself with every appearance of terror
and contrition.

"Nay, if he is in the chapel room," the priest murmured, "were it at my
soul's cost, I must save him."

Three minutes later, Dick, who had been summoned by another messenger,
found Sir Oliver standing by the hall table, resolute and pale.

"Richard Shelton," he