The daughter of princes, the wife of two kings, as she was to be, and the mother of two kings, and of many more in line after them, she drew down her veil that none might see her face under the dim lights, and she went out thence, very lonely and sad, into the streets of Jerusalem.
At midnight came a priest of the church to trim the lights at the tomb; yet the three did not move, and he prayed awhile and went away. But when the watchmen cried the dawning, and their voices came faintly in by the doorway, floating through the dark church, Gilbert rose to his feet, and Dunstan with him, and they took their arms with them, and went away, leaving the Lady Anne the last of them all, her white hands still clasping the iron bars, her sad black eyes still turned to heaven.
Faint streaks were in the eastern sky, but it was still almost dark as the two men turned to the left to follow the way by which they had come. Three steps from the door, Dunstan stumbled against something neither hard nor soft, and in many fights he had learned what that thing was.
"There is a dead man here," he said, and Gilbert had stopped also.
They stooped down, trying to see, and Dunstan felt along the body, touching the mantle, till he found something sharp, which was the point of a dagger out of its sheath.
"He is a knight," said Dunstan, "for he wears his surcoat and sword-belt under his mantle."
But Gilbert was gazing into the face, trying to see, while the dust under the head grew slowly grey in the dawn, and the waxen features seemed to rise up out of the earth before him. But then he started, for, as he looked down, his own eyes were but a hand-breadth from an arrow-head that stuck straight up out of the dead forehead, and the broken shaft with its feathers darkly soiled lay half under the body. Dunstan also looked, and a low sound of gladness came from his fierce lips.
"It is Arnold de Curboil!" exclaimed Gilbert, in measureless surprise.
"And this is Alric's arrow," answered Dunstan, looking at the point, and then handling the piece of the broken shaft. "This is the arrow that was sticking in your cap on that day when we fought for sport in Tuscany, and Alric picked it up and kept it. And often in battle he had but that one left, and would not shoot, saying that it was only to be shot to save his master's life. So now it has done its work, for though the knight was shot from behind, he has his dagger in his dead hand under his cloak, and he must have followed you to the door of the church to kill you in the dark within. Well done, little Alric!"
Then Dunstan spat in the face of the dead man and cursed him; but
Gilbert took his man by the collar and pulled him aside roughly.