"Yolande!" he whispered, "now thou art one among the holy angels, O forget not thy most unworthy Benedict. God--O God! Father to whom all hearts are open, Thou dost know how as child and maid I loved her, how as a wife I loved her still--how, in my madness, I spake my love--and she, being saint and woman, bade me to my duty. So, by her purity, kept she my honour unstained--"
Beltane's long scabbard struck the carven panelling, a soft blow that yet echoed and re-echoed in vaulted arch and dim roof, and, glancing swiftly up, Sir Benedict beheld him.
And kneeling thus beside the grave of the woman he had loved, Sir Benedict looked up into Beltane's face with eyes wide, eyes unflinching but dimmed with great grief and pain.
Quoth he, firm-voiced: "My lord, thou hast learned my life's secret, but, ere thou dost judge me, hear this! Long ere thy princely father met thy mother, we loved, she and I, and in our love grew up together. Then came the Duke thy father, a mighty lord; and her mother was ambitious and very guileful-- and she--but a maid. Thus was she wed. Then rode I to the foreign wars seeking death--but death took me not. So, the wars ended, came I home again, burning ever with my love, and sought her out, and beholding the sadness in her eyes I spake my love; and forgetful of honour and all save her sweet soul and the glory of her beauty, I tempted her--aye, many times!--tempted her in fashion merciless and cruel insomuch that she wept many bitter tears, and, upon a day, spake me thus: 'Benedict, 'tis true I loved thee, for thou wert a noble knight--but now, an thy love for me be so small that thou canst bring me to this shame, then-- take me where thou wilt--but--ne'er shall all thy love nor all my tears thereafter cleanse us from the shame of it.' Thus went I from her, nor have I looked on woman since. So followed I thy father in all his warring and all my days have I fought much--fierce foes within me and without, and lived--a very solitary life. And to-day she lieth dead--and I am here, old and worn, a lonely man and sinful, to be judged of as ye will."
Then came Beltane and looked down into Sir Benedict's pale, sad face. And beholding him thus in his abasement, haggard with wounds and bowed with grief, needs must Beltane kneel also and thereafter spake thus: "Sir Benedict, who am I, to judge of such as thou?"