your
high hopes and great promise should miss fulfilment."

Nigel looked at her with sparkling eyes. The soul which shone through
her dark face had transformed it for the moment into a beauty more
lofty and more rare than that of her shallow sister. He bowed before the
majesty of the woman, and pressed his lips to her hand. "You are like
a star upon my path which guides me on the upward way," said he. "Our
souls are set together upon the finding of honor, and how shall we hold
each other back when our purpose is the same?"

She shook her proud head. "So it seems to you now, fair lord, but it may
be otherwise as the years pass. How shall you prove that I am indeed a
help and not a hindrance?"

"I will prove it by my deeds, fair and dear lady," said Nigel. "Here at
the shrine of the holy Catharine, on this, the Feast of Saint Margaret,
I take my oath that I will do three deeds in your honor as a proof of my
high love before I set eyes upon your face again, and these three deeds
shall stand as a proof to you that if I love you dearly, still I will
not let the thought of you stand betwixt me and honorable achievement!"

Her face shone with her love and her pride. "I also make my oath," said
she, "and I do it in the name of the holy Catharine whose shrine is hard
by. I swear that I will hold myself for you until these three deeds be
done and we meet once more; also that if--which may dear Christ forfend!
you fall in doing them then I shall take the veil in Shalford nunnery
and look upon no man's face again! Give me your hand, Nigel."

She had taken a little bangle of gold filigree work from her arm and
fastened it upon his sunburnt wrist, reading aloud to him the engraved
motto in old French: "Fais ce que dois, adviegne que pourra--c'est
commande au chevalier." Then for one moment they fell into each other's
arms and with kiss upon kiss, a loving man and a tender woman, they
swore their troth to each other. But the old knight was calling
impatiently from below and together they hurried down the winding path
to where the horses waited under the sandy bluff.

As far as the Shalford crossing Sir John rode by Nigel's arm, and many
were the last injunctions which he gave him concerning woodcraft, and
great his anxiety lest he confuse a spay with a brocket, or either with
a hind. At last when they came to the reedy edge of the Wey the old
knight and his daughter reined up their horses. Nigel looked back at
them ere he enter