Dropping my sword, I sprang forward with one bound, and caught him by one hand on his throat, the other clutching the arm that held the dagger. A short struggle, and I felt him grow limp under my iron grasp, for I held his throat like a vise. Carrying him forward in my arms to the window, and laying him down on the floor, I peered into his face. It was the fat priest.
I waited patiently, the dagger that he had dropped clasped in my hand. It was a long, sharp blade, and had it not been for my ghostly visitant, I would even now sleep that sleep that knows no waking.
A long sigh from the priest; he was coming to his senses. Sitting up, he looked around him, and catching sight of me as I stood opposite, the dagger in my hand, he cowered back against the wall, and covered his face with his hand.
"Listen," I said, bending toward him. "One sound, and I will run this dagger into that craven heart of thine. If thou dost fail to answer one question of mine, I shall say no word, but I will kill thee where thou sittest. Take away thy hand from thine eyes, and answer me quickly, as I put the questions to thee. Dost hear?"
Father Francis had jerked his hands from his face like a puppet figure, and now he sat by the window, his ruddy face all white and ghastly in the moonlight. "What wouldst thou have?" he moaned.
"Who sent thee here?" I asked. "Answer me quickly and truly, or into the nether world thou goest," and I flashed his dagger in his face.
"In the name of Heaven!" he cried in alarm. "Good Sir Thomas, brandish not the dagger about me so recklessly; should it but slip and strike me, I would be done for this world," and he shrank back against the wall.
"It would but serve thee right," I answered grimly. "Thou deservest no better fate. Answer me as I tell thee," and I pricked his fat arm with the point of the weapon.
With a loud howl of pain, he rubbed the injured spot vigorously.
"No one sent me," he said sullenly. "Didst thou not strike me down but a few short hours ago, without cause or provocation, as I walked peaceably along the shore, and then take from me papers that concerned thee not? Am I a man, that I should bear such treatment as this quietly? My head rings yet from the blow," and he raised his hand to his forehead, where there was a great swollen place as large as an egg.