"So!" said the prelate, fixing his gray dark-rimmed irises on the prisoner, "you are he who give yourself out to be the Archpriest of Caio?"
"I am he," answered Pabo.
The bishop assured himself that the strongly built upright man before him was bound and could not hurt him; and he said to the attendants, "Go forth outside the door and leave this dissembler with me. Yet remain within call, and one bid Gerald, the Master, come to me speedily."
The men withdrew.
"I wonder," said Bernard, and his words hissed through the gap in his teeth, "I wonder now at thy audacity. If indeed I held thee to be Pabo, the late Archpriest of Caio, who smote me, his bishop, on the mouth and drew my blood, there would be no other course for me but to deliver thee over to the secular arm, and for such an act of treason against thy superior in God—the stake would be thy due."
"I am he, Lord Bishop, who struck thee on the mouth. The insult was intolerable. The old law provided—an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. If thou goest by the law of Moses deal with me as seems right. What the Gospel law is, maybe thou art too recent in Holy Orders and too new to the study of the Sacred Scriptures to be aware."
"Thou art insolent. But as I do not for a moment take thee to be the deceased Pabo——"
"Lord Bishop, none doubt that I am he."
Bernard looked at him from head to foot.
"Methinks a taller man by three fingers' breadth, and leaner in face certainly, as also browner in complexion, and with cheek-bones standing out more forcibly."