"How now!" cried the baron, "wherefore in such haste? I trow the deed is ours!"
With a great show of obedience and respect he drew the parchment again from beneath his robe, and holding it cautiously beside him, exclaimed—
"My lord, ere this be read is it not prudent that we convey the traitor to the dungeon, lest by his subtilty the writing be wrested from our grasp?"
The hermit, yet held in close custody of the guards, cried with a loud voice—
"Who is the traitor let the walls of my cell bear witness, when they heard him offer a heavy bribe that this, the only evidence to the right of the Fitz-Eustace, might be destroyed!"
"Fatherest thou the accursed progeny of thine avarice upon me?" cried the dean, apparently indignant at so unjust an accusation.
"Give me the roll," said the constable, "and we will confront him by what he would have withheld. After we have made our own right secure, we adjudge him to his deserts."
The dean was obliged, however unwillingly, to obey; hand
ing forward the parchment, which Roger de Lacy unfolded in the presence of the hermit. But it would be impossible to describe the consternation of the chieftain when he read therein a formal grant, bequeathing the whole of these vast possessions to Robert de Whalley and his heirs for ever.
The dean, apparently with surprise, and a well-feigned indignation at the fraud which the hermit intended to have put upon him, exclaimed—