I had managed to tide over the meal with fair success. We had reached the dessert, and Pascoe (whose presence may have laid some restraint upon his master) had withdrawn. A dish of pears lay before Lady Glynn, and she asked me to peel one for her. I know not if this simple request laid the last straw on Sir Luke's endurance, but he filled his glass again and said with brutal insolence,-- 'You are fortunate, Captain Medhope, in exciting my wife's interest. I assure you that until your gallantry bewitched her, she had been used to speak of all rebels as cowards in grain.' 'I hope, Sir Luke,' said I, 'you, with experience of us, have tried to teach her better.' 'In faith, no,' he replied yet more brutally, backing his sneer with a laugh. 'I saw no reason for that.' 'And yet,' said I deliberately, peeling my pear, 'you told me to-day that something might be said even for such a man as your friend Chester.' He jumped up with an oath. Yet I believe he might even now have restrained himself had not his wife--and with a face as pale as a ghost's--laid a hand on my arm. 'I had forgotten your wound,' she said, ignoring her husband. 'You handle the knife awkwardly. Let me cut the fruit and we will share.' With a turn of the hand Sir Luke hurled back his chair, and it fell with a crash. 'By God, Kate! if you have hired this man, he shall murder first and do his love-making afterwards. Nay, but I'll stop that, too. Look first to yourself, madame!' He had whipped out his sword and was actually running upon her before I could get mine clear. But I was in time to beat down his point and then--for he was slow-witted and three-parts drunk--with a trick of wrist that luckily required little strength, I disarmed him. His sword struck the farther edge of the table, smashed a decanter of wine and dropped to the floor. We were standing now, all three; Lady Glynn a little behind my elbow. 'Are you going to kill him?' she asked, and he heard. For a moment he stared at her stupidly, then at the stream of wine running across the table, then back at her--and, so staring, flung up both hands and plunged forward. His brow, as he fell like an ox, thudded against the chair from which, a moment since, she had arisen. I caught up a candle. But she was before me and had dropped on her knees beside him. In his fall he had rolled over on his side, and for a moment I supposed her to be busy loosening his collar. But no--as I held the candle close she was feeling in his pockets, and in the light of it she held up a bunch of keys. 'I am glad you did not kill him,' she said simply, rising from her knees. 'There was no need.' 'No need?' I repeated stupidly, swaying with weakness. 'You shall see.'