"Aye, and rejoiced in it, for fighting is the breath of Benet's life. But they were too many for him,—one acted a coward's part and stabbed him in the back."
Now at this my heart was sore, for although Benet and I had scarcely ever met save to fight, and although he was a wild savage fellow, I could not help loving him.
"But he died like a man," I cried; "he showed no fear?"
"He died grandly. He had but one regret at dying, he said."
"And that?" I asked eagerly.
"I was not there, but one who was, told me. 'Aye, I am grieved,' he said, 'Trevanion promised to fight me. He was the only real man who ever faced me, and now I shall not live to prove that I was the better man of the two.'"
We kept Uncle Anthony more than an hour, but we could not prevail upon him to stay all night. It was not for him, he said, to stay at Trevanion on the night after our wedding-day, but before he went he told us many things concerning his life which I could not understand before. I need not write them down here, for he would not wish it. I will only say that the remembrance of the love he once bore for a maid made him love Nancy as a daughter, and this almost led to a breach between him and the Killigrews.
"You will come again as soon as you can?" I said to him when at length he left the house.
"Aye, as soon as I can. May God bless you, Roger Trevanion."
"He hath blessed me," I answered; "blessed me more than I believed possible."