"Your ancestors," said he, "used to serve in the Order, and you wished to join it also; but we do not receive traitors."
"And I do not wish to serve with traitors."
"Ej! you shall not fulfill your threat. The Order knows how to punish not only the monks——"
Sir de Fourcy being excited by these words, drew his sword, and seized the blade with his left hand; his right hand he put on the hilt and said:
"On this hilt which is in the form of the cross, on St. Denis, my patron's head, and on my knightly honor, I swear that I will warn the Mazowiecki prince and the grand master."
Hugo von Danveld again looked inquiringly at Zygfried von Löve, who closed his eyelids, as if consenting to something.
Then Danveld said in a strangely muffled and changed voice:
"St. Denis could carry his head after he was beheaded, but when yours once falls down——"
"Are you threatening me?" interrupted de Fourcy.
"No, but I kill!" answered Danveld. And he thrust his knife into de Fourcy's side with such strength, that the blade disappeared up to the hilt. De Fourcy screamed dreadfully; for a while he tried to seize his sword which he held in his left hand, with his right, but he dropped it; at the same time, the other three brothers began to pierce him mercilessly with their knives, in the neck, in the back, and in the stomach, until he fell from his horse.