"Gentle lording," he said, "you called me even now the friend of Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland. Let me say presently that by my office I stand above that lord, though far below him in my person. So I am no friend of his, though not his foe." The Young Lovell held his brows down and gazed upon this man beneath them, breathing heavily in his chest. "Go on," he said. "Then I will tell you this," the Cornish knight went on. "I have heard you twice say ye were beneath a ban. Now that may well be and I think it is along of a White Lady." The Young Lovell loosened his dagger within its sheath. "My silken knight," he said, "ye were never so near your death." "Gentle lording," that knight answered, "if I die another will take my place and no one will lament me. But it is my function and devoir to talk and so I take it." He paused for a moment, and then he went on: "God forbid that I should say word against Holy Church; I am not one that does it. Yet I will say this: If Holy Church will not raise the ban from you, yet I, Sir Bertram of Lyonesse, who have some skill at inquiries, will so put this matter to the King and dread lord that, without more words said, that judgment of the Warden’s Court against you shall be revised, and if those false Knights shall withhold your Castle from you you shall have instant licence to take it again and do justice upon them as you will. And the fines due of you under that judgment shall be remitted to you. For I acknowledge that therein the Percy hath overstepped himself; for firstly he can give no judgment and foul no bill upon a suit of sorcery. And secondly, I am convinced that here was no sorcery. For, touching that White Lady...." "Sir Knight," the Young Lovell said, "I bid you stand aside from that door and see a thing...." Then Sir Bertram stepped down into the roadway. The Young Lovell took out his dagger and raised it above his shoulder. It was of the length of his forearm. The door that stood against the wall, being open, was of thick oak, studded with large bosses of iron. The Young Lovell brought forward that dagger over his head and it sank into that door up to the hilt, and sank in and passed through the door, and so into the mortar between two stories and the door was nailed there. "Sir," the Young Lovell said, "seek to withdraw that dagger." "Nay, that I cannot do," Sir Bertram said. "Neither can I nor any man," the Young Lovell said. "And I am glad of it. For if you had spoken more upon that theme, that dagger should have gone through your throat. And this I tell you: there is no knight in all the North parts that could have done that, and I think none in all Christendom. How it may be in Heathenesse I do not know, for I hear that the Soldan has some very good knights. And that I did to show you that I am no braggart if you will hear me further."