And now I minded that this man had been one of those who gave evidence of my lonely rides and secret meetings. So he had been bought thus, for my sword was a good one, and the hilt curiously wrought in ivory and silver. Then I made no more delay, but stripped the man of his armour, and also of the stout leathern jerkin he wore beneath it, for I was clad in the rags of feasting garb, as I have said, and hated them even as I threw them aside. The man was of my own height and build, as it chanced, and his gear fitted me well. So I took his hide shoes also, casting away my frayed velvet foot coverings into the underwood. Now once more I stood clad in the arms of a free man and how good it was to feel again the well known and loved weight of mail, and helm, and sword tugging at me I cannot say. But this I know, that, like the strong man of old our old priest told me of, as I shook myself, my strength and manhood came back to me. But now, whereas I had been haled from my feasting a careless boy, and had stood before my judges as an angry man, as I look back, I see that from that arming I rose up a grim and desperate warrior with wrongs to right, and the will and strength to right them. So I stood for a little, and the savage thoughts that went through my mind I may not write. Then I turned to my captive and looked at him, though I thought nothing concerning him. But what he saw written in my face as it glowered on him from under the helmet bade him cry aloud to me to spare him. And at that I laughed. It was so good to feel that this enemy of mine feared me. At that laugh--and it sounded not like my own, even to myself--the man writhed, and besought me again for mercy. But I had no mind to kill him, and a thought crossed me. "Matelgar bade you slay me," I said, "that I know. Tell me why he has sought my life and I will spare you." "Master," said the man hastily, "I knew not whom I was to slay. Matelgar bade me follow Gurth yonder, and smite whom he smote." "It would have mattered not--you would have slain me as well as any other." "Nay, master," the man said earnestly, "that would I not." "You lie," I answered curtly enough; "like master like man. Tell me what I bade you." "Truly I lie not, Heregar," cried he, "for I love my mistress over well to harm you." Now at that mention of Alswythe the blood rushed into my face, for I had held her false with the rest, and this seemed to say otherwise, unless the plot had been hidden from such as this man. But I would fain learn more of that, for the sake of the hope of a love I had thought true. "What is your mistress to me?" I asked. "Ye are all alike." I think the man could see well at what I aimed, for he spoke of the Lady Alswythe more freely than he would have dared at other times, nor would I have let him name her lightly.