THE BUCKLER


It was old Nicholas who brought the news next morning to the brothers as
they were breaking their fast.

Lionel should have kept his bed that day, but dared not, lest the fact
should arouse suspicion. He had a little fever, the natural result both
of his wound and of his loss of blood; he was inclined to welcome rather
than deplore it, since it set a flush on cheeks that otherwise must have
looked too pale.

So leaning upon his brother's arm he came down to a breakfast of
herrings and small ale before the tardy sun of that December morning was
well risen.

Nicholas burst in upon them with a white face and shaking limbs. He
gasped out his tale of the event in a voice of terror, and both brothers
affected to be shocked, dismayed and incredulous. But the worst part of
that old man's news, the true cause of his terrible agitation, was yet
to be announced.

"And they do zay," he cried with anger quivering through his fear, "they
do zay that it were you that killed he, Sir Oliver."

"I?" quoth Sir Oliver, staring, and suddenly like a flood there burst
upon his mind a hundred reasons overlooked until this moment, that
inevitably must urge the countryside to this conclusion, and to this
conclusion only. "Where heard you that foul lie?"