"A curse upon that Italian priest whom I captured with the Bishop of Nantes! That Jeronimo turned my head speaking to me of the Crusade. He made me fear for my salvation, pointing out that the hand of God weighed heavy upon me by the death of one of my sons, killed by his own brother!"
"Both your sons are dead, Neroweg! I myself felled the fratricide with a blow of my iron bar at the moment he was about to do violence to the daughter of Bezenecq the Rich! Both the wolves and the whelps of the seigniories are beasts of prey and of carnage. They must be exterminated!"
"My son Gonthram did not die, and Jeronimo promised me, in the name of God, that if I departed for the Crusade and let the Bishop of Nantes free, I would insure the recovery of my son. Oh, heart-broken at the sight of one son dead and the other dying, I was bereft of reasoning! I obeyed the priest and departed for Palestine,—to my greater undoing. Bitterly I repent the day!"
Fergan, struck at the tenderness that the seigneur of Plouernel had not been able to suppress at the mention of his son Gonthram, said to him: "You love your son?"
Neroweg shot with his eyes daggers of hatred at the serf as he lay stretched out on the sand at the latter's feet. Two tears rolled down his savage face. But wishing to conceal his emotions from Fergan, he turned his head brusquely aside. Joan and Colombaik, having drawn near the quarryman, listened in silence to his dialogue with Neroweg. While the seigneur sought to hide his tears, the woman saw them and said in a whisper to her husband: "Despite his wickedness, that seigneur weeps at the thought of his son. His sorrow affects me."
"Oh, father," put in Colombaik, joining his hands, "if he weeps, be you merciful! Do not harm him!"
The serf remained silent a moment, then, addressing his seigneur said: "You are moved at the thought of your child, and yet you meant to have mine strangled. Do you imagine a serf has not, like you, a father's heart?"
Neroweg answered with an outburst of sarcastic laughter.
"What are you laughing about?"
"I laughed as I would if I heard an ass, or other beast of burden, talk about his 'father's heart,'" rejoined the seigneur of Plouernel. "You vagabond, were I not in your power now, I would kill you for the vile dog that you are!"