"Sir," says she, "be you what you will, you are a man! Who you are I know and care not--but you have this night wrought that I shall nevermore forget and now I--we--would fain express our gratitude--"
"Indeed and indeed!" said the maid Marjorie, speaking for the first time.
"I want no gratitude!" says I, mighty gruff.
"Yet shall it follow thee, for the passion of gratitude is strong and may not be denied--even by beggar so proud and arrogant!" And now, hearkening to this voice, so deep and soft and strangely sweet, I knew not if she laughed at me or no; but even as I debated this within myself, she lifted my hand, the hand that grasped the knife, and I felt the close, firm pressure of two warm, soft lips; then she had freed me and I fell back a step, striving for speech yet finding none.
"God love me!" quoth I at last. "Why must you--do so!"
"And wherefore not?" she questioned proudly.
"'Tis the hand of a vagrant, an outcast, a poor creeper o' ditches!" says I.
"But a man's hand!" she answered.
"'Tis at hand that hath slain once this night and shall slay again ere many hours be sped." Now here I heard her sigh as one that is troubled.
"And yet," says she gently, "'tis no murderer's hand and you that are vagrant and outcast are no rogue."
"How judge ye this, having never seen me?" I questioned.
"In that I am a woman. For God hath armed our weakness with a gift of knowledge whereby we may oft-times know truth from falsehood, the noble from the base, 'spite all their outward seeming. So do I judge you no rogue--a strong man but very--aye, very young that, belike, hath suffered unjustly, and being so young art fierce and impatient of all things, and apt to rail bitterly 'gainst the world. Is't not so?"
"Aye," says I, marvelling, "truly 'tis like witchcraft--mayhap you will speak me my name." At this she laughed (most wonderful to hear and vastly so to such coarse rogue as I, whose ears had long been strangers to aught but sounds of evil and foul obscenity): "Nay," says she, "my knowledge of you goeth no further--but--" (and here she paused to fetch a shuddering breath) "but for him you killed--that two-legged beast! You did but what I would have done for--O man, had you not come I--I should have killed him, maid though I am! See, here is the dagger I snatched from his girdle as he strove with me. O, take it--take it!" And, with a passionate gesture, she thrust the weapon into my grasp.