“A charge of murder,” echoed Manners blankly, “a charge of murder, and against me!  This is past endurance, ’tis monstrous!  Whom have I slain, I pray thee tell me?”

“The Derby packman,” promptly returned De la Zouch, “and thou knowest I saw thee do it.”

“You lie.  I never saw the man until he was dead.  Thou shalt prove thy words, Sir Henry de la Zouch,” returned the esquire, “or I shall have thee branded as a knave.  There is some cause for this, Sir George,” he added, turning to the baron, “of which I am in ignorance.  I am the victim of some plot.”

“Like enough, like enough,” returned the baron, sympathetically.  “Then you deny the charge?  I knew De la Zouch was wrong.  The ordeal—­”

“But I saw him myself, and so did Eustace,” stuck out the disappointed lover; “and Margaret remembers that Master Manners was left behind.”

“And for the matter of that, so were you,” said Sir George sharply.

“And Eustace is but a page who must, perforce, obey his master’s will in everything,” continued Manners.  “Crowleigh was with me all the day, save when I went back to Mistress Dorothy.  How tallies that with your account, eh?”

“That was precisely the time it occurred, and bears me out in all that I have said,” glibly responded the scion of the house of Zouch.  “It all but proves his guilt, Sir George.”

“Nay, not so much as that,” quoth Lady Maude; “but since it cannot be agreed upon, I should advise you to let the matter drop.”

“Stop,” exclaimed Manners.  “If De la Zouch has a spark of honour left within him he will step out and measure swords with me, for by my troth I swear he will have to render me the satisfaction my honour demands.”

This was by no means to the taste of the knight of Ashby.  He had not calculated for such a course as this; but, fortunately for him, Lady Vernon spoke, and unwittingly released him from his difficulty.

“Nay, not before me,” she said, “and on so festal a day as this.”

“As you will it,” said De la Zouch, assuming an air of injured dignity.

“They must settle it in true old knightly fashion at the tourney,” exclaimed Sir George decisively.

“Since you command it I suppose I must obey,” replied Sir Henry; “but I had rather not have stained my weapons with the blood of so foul a caitiff.”

“You will be good enough to leave me to decide that matter,” said the baron testily.

“Then, by St. George, I shall be ready,” replied Manners.  “I am as well born as he, and can give him a lesson or two in good breeding, besides showing him a trick or two with the sword that I learned in the Netherlands.  In the meantime I disdain him as a dog;” and boiling over with rage the maligned esquire left the little group and stalked across the terrace to rejoin the ladies on the green.

CHAPTER VII.