he asked in a small, strange voice; then, still
as any statue, awaited the answer that was more to her than life.

"Nay, daughter. Down on your knees and give thanks. God, by the skill I
gained in Eastern lands, has stayed the flow of his life's blood, and I
say that he will live."

Then he showed her how her father's sword had glanced from the short
hood of chain-mail which he had given Hugh, stunning him, but leaving
the skull unbroken. Biting into the neck below, it had severed the outer
vein only. This he had tied with a thread of silk and burned with a hot
iron, leaving a scar that Hugh bore to his death, but staunching the
flow of blood.

"How know you that he will live?" asked Eve again, "seeing that he lies
like one that is sped."

"I know it, daughter. Question me no more. As for his stillness, it is
that which follows a heavy blow. Perhaps it may hold him fast many days,
since certainly he will be sick for long. Yet fear nothing; he will
live."

Now Eve uttered a great sigh. Her breast heaved and colour returned to
her lips. She knelt down and gave thanks as the old priest-knight had
bidden her. Then she rose, took his hand and kissed it.

"Yet one more question, Father," she said. "It is of myself. That knave
drugged me. I drank milk, and, save some dreams, remember no more till
I heard Hugh's voice calling. Now they tell me that I have stood at the
altar with de Noyon, and that his priest read the mass of marriage over
us, and--look! Oh! I never noted it till now--there is a ring upon my
hand," and she cast it on the floor. "Tell me, Father, according to the
Church's law is that man my--my husband?"

Sir Andrew's eloquent dark eyes, that ever shadowed forth the thoughts
which passed within him, grew very troubled.

"I cannot tell you," he answered awkwardly after thinking a while. "This
priest, Nicholas, though I hold him a foul villain, is doubtless still
a priest, clothed with all the authority of our Lord Himself, since the
unworthiness of the minister does not invalidate the sacrament. Were
it otherwise, indeed, few would be well baptized or wed or shriven.
Moreover, although I suspect that himself he mixed the draught, yet he
may not have known that you were drugged, and you stood silent, and, it
would appear, consenting. The ceremony, alas! was completed; I myself
heard him give the benediction. Your father assisted thereat and gave
you to the groom in the presence of a congregation. The drugg