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It was in that moment that Halfman burst into the pleasaunce. "Why, what's the matter here?" he cited, wielding his staff as if it had been the scimitar of the Moor. "Hold, for your lives! For Christian shame put by this barbarous brawl." The disputants greeted their interrupter differently. Evander paid Halfman's memory the tribute of an appreciative smile.
The last blow was so surely delivered that had it been given with greater force it might have knocked the receiver senseless. As it was, however, it was given with such deliberate delicacy that, though Halfman's head hummed for the moment and his eyes saw stars, he rallied quickly enough to stare at Evander where he stood with lowered point and to tender him a salutation of honest admiration.
Let us rather to the library for volumes of divinity." This time the intention to affront was so patent, so patent, too, that Halfman's temper was getting the better of whatever discretion he possessed, that Evander's face hardened, and yet for his own reasons he still spoke mildly enough: "There is no need to call me worship, for I can claim no such title.
Why, Gammer Satchell carries herself more soldierly." Timothy Garlinge grinned loutishly at this rebuke, but the fat dame whom Halfman's flourish indicated seemed to dilate with satisfaction. "It were shame," she chuckled, "if a handy lass could not better a lobbish lad." The impish lad grinned derision. "Ay," he commented; "but an old fool's best at her spits and griddles."
Halfman's head was swinging with pleasure. She had counted him in so glibly with the chosen ones, with the servants of God and the King. He was very sure now that his watch-word had always been "God and the King." "The King's cause must triumph," he echoed, his face shining with loyal confidence.
Brilliana and the Cavaliers, stirred by the enthusiasm of Halfman's stanza, caught up the cry commanded and sent it rolling through the hall. "Vive le Roy! God bless the King!" they shouted, with the loyal tears in their eyes. Brilliana gave Halfman a grateful smile. "Well sung, well done," she approved. Halfman glowed. Sir Rufus frowned a little.
Halfman turned a scowling face upon the knight as he answered, malevolently: "Swamped, water-logged, foundering. You are a pretty parrakeet to come between me and my musings." The tone of Halfman's speech, the way of Halfman's demeanor were so offensive that the knight's cheap dignity took fire. He swelled with displeasure, flushed very red in the gills, and cleared his throat for reproof.
Yet the fellow stood his ground sturdily enough, and stared at Brilliana with no sense of distress at his dirty homespun or his dirty hands. "You sent for me?" he challenged. "Have you changed your mood? I am ever of the same mind, and will wed when you will." The wolf look leaped into Halfman's eyes, and the loutish squire's life was, all unawares, in the greatest peril it had ever fringed.
There was no help to be had in the neighborhood, but by Halfman's advice a message was trusted to a sure hand to be carried to Sir Randolph Harby, of Harby Lesser, now with the King, telling him of what was threatened. All the servants were assembled in the great hall, and there Brilliana made them a stirring little speech, to which Halfman listened with applauding pulses.
Then the judge embraced Halfman and said to him: 'You have done well, my son. Take your bride, and may you both live long and happily together! At the end of the year Halfman's wife had a son, and not long after she came one day hastily into the room, and found her husband weeping. 'What is the matter? she asked. 'The matter? said he. 'Yes, why are you weeping?
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