“On my faith!” answered he at length, “I marvel much that any youth with the Moreville blood in his veins can be such a dullard as to ask such a question. But an answer you shall have. You were seized and brought hither because you were engaged in attempts at variance with the laws of the land and the authority of the barons, the conservators of the charter signed at Runnymede.”
“Answer me two questions,” said Oliver, sternly. “Am I a prisoner? and if so, is my life aimed at?”
“Everything depends on yourself. Meanwhile, you have letters from Queen Isabel to King John. Hand them to me.”
“You do me great injustice,” said Oliver, “in supposing it possible that, if intrusted with letters, I should render them to any but the person for whose hand they were intended.”
“Is that your answer?” fiercely demanded De Moreville.
“It is my answer,” retorted Oliver, with equal heat; “and it is an answer more courteous than you deserve.”
“By the bones of St. Moden!” exclaimed De Moreville, with a frowning brow, “I can no longer brook such obstinacy! May I become an Englishman if I bend or break not your proud spirit ere the year is much nearer midsummer!” and he blew a silver whistle that lay at his side, the sound of which instantly brought Ralph Hornmouth and another man-at-arms into the chamber.
“Ho, there! Ralph Hornmouth,” said De Moreville, fiercely, “give me the letters which this varlet has about him. Methinks, from the direction his eye took when I mentioned them, he has them in his boots.”
Hornmouth and his comrade obeyed; and Oliver, notwithstanding a brave struggle, had the bitter mortification, while prostrated on his back and held down, of seeing the queen’s letter taken from his boot and handed to the Norman baron; but no second letter could be found, for the very excellent reason that no such letter had ever been in existence.
Meanwhile, De Moreville perused the epistle slowly, and as he read, his countenance evinced disappointment. It seemed, indeed, that the letter did not contain the kind of information he expected; and he turned to Oliver, who was again on his feet, almost weeping from rage, and regarding his kinsman with angry glances.