"
"Thou wilt, then," said the knight, "do nothing to avert the certain
fate which thou hast provoked with such wantonness?"
"And how were that to be purchased?" replied Halbert Glendinning, more
with the wish of obtaining some farther insight into the terms on
which he stood with this stranger, than to make him the submission
which he might require.
"Explain to me instantly," said Sir Piercie, "without equivocation or
delay, by what means thou wert enabled to wound my honour so
deeply--and shouldst thou point out to me by so doing an enemy more
worthy of my resentment, I will permit thine own obscure
insignificance to draw a veil over thine insolence."
"This is too high a flight," said Glendinning, fiercely, "for thine
own presumption to soar without being checked. Thou hast come to my
father's house, as well as I can guess, a fugitive and an exile, and
thy first greeting to its inhabitants has been that of contempt and
injury. By what means I have been able to retort that contempt, let
thine own conscience tell thee. Enough for me that I stand on the
privilege of a free Scotchman, and will brook no insult unreturned,
and no injury unrequited."
"It is well, then," said Sir Piercie Shafton; "we will dispute this
matter to-morrow morning with our swords. Let the time be daybreak,
and do thou assign the place. We will go forth as if to strike a
deer."
"Content," replied Halbert Glendinning: "I will guide thee to a spot
where an hundred men might fight and fall without any chance of
interruption.
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