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With similar indifference the Constable signed to his esquire to give him the arrow looked at it with indolent curiosity, and then said, "Thou hast forgotten thy old craft, Guarine, when thou callest that a Welsh shaft. Trust me, it flew from a Norman bow; but why it should be found in the body of that English churl, I can ill guess."
"Lord, how you startle me, sir!" said Gillian; then continued, turning to Philip Guarine, "Your friend is a hasty man, belike."; "It is the fault of the sun he has lived under so long," said the squire; "but look you answer his questions truly, and he will make it the better for you." Gillian instantly took the hint. "Was it Damian de Lacy you asked after?
A thousand little darts perplexed and annoyed the noble animal, ere he received the last deadly thrust from the lance of the Moorish Cavalier." "Man, or fiend, be which thou wilt," replied Guarine, "that can thus drink in with pleasure, and contemplate at your ease, the misery of another, I bid thee beware of me!
"A truce with your prating, dame," said Raoul, offering his assistance to help her from the croupe; but she preferred that of Guarine, who, though advanced in years, retained the advantage of his stout soldierly figure. "And, pray, sir, are ye come from the Holy Land? Heard ye any tidings there of him that was Constable of Chester?"
Up, up, and arm thee, son of terror! Be thy bright shield the morning's mirror." When the song was finished, the Constable heard some talking without, and presently Philip Guarine entered the pavilion to tell that a person, come hither as he said by the Constable's appointment, waited permission to speak with him. "By my appointment?" said De Lacy; "admit him immediately."
The leathern doublet of the slain bespoke him an English peasant the body lay on its face, and the arrow which had caused his death still stuck in his back. Philip Guarine, with the cool indifference of one accustomed to such scenes, drew the shaft from the man's back, as composedly as he would have removed it from the body of a deer.
At the same time the voice of the vigilant Philip Guarine whispered in his ear, "Thine office for the night is ended depart to thine own quarters with all the silence thou mayst." The minstrel wrapt himself in his cloak without reply, though perhaps not without feeling some resentment at a dismissal so unceremonious. Oh! then I see Queen Mab has been with you.
There was no immediate answer, until Philip Guarine, stepping from the group which stood behind the royal chair, said, though with hesitation, "So please you, my liege, but for the strange guise in which he is now arrayed, I should say there was a household minstrel of my master, by name Renault Vidal."
"Nothing, good Guarine," said Eveline; "only this small donative to procure wine for thy soldiers, that they may spend the next night more merrily than the last. And now he is gone, Maiden, thou must, I think, be now well aware, that what thou sawest was no earthly being?" "I must believe mine own ears and eyes, madam," replied Rose. "Do but allow me the same privilege," answered Eveline.
At length a convulsive movement crossed the brow of the Constable, and Guarine, when he beheld a sardonic smile begin to curl Vidal's lip, could keep silence no longer. "Vidal," he said, "thou art a "
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