No one was so well content with himself as Hereward; and therefore he fancied that the world must be equally content with him, and he was much disconcerted when Martin drew him aside one day, and whispered: “If I were my lord, I should wear a mail shirt under my coat to-morrow out hunting.”
“What?”
“The arrow that can go through a deer’s bladebone can go through a man’s.”
“Who should harm me?”
“Any man of the dozen who eat at the same table.”
“What have I done to them? If I had my laugh at them, they had their laugh at me; and we are quits.”
“There is another score, my lord, which you have forgotten, and that is all on your side.”
“Eh?”
“You killed the bear. Do you expect them to forgive you that, till they have repaid you with interest?”
“Pish!”