keen and bright as if it had just left the armourer's hands, clashing
upon Gilbert's hacked and blood-rusted blade.

Sir Arnold was a brave man, but he was also cautious. He expected to
find in Gilbert a beginner of small skill and reckless bravery, who
would expose himself for the sake of bringing in a sweeping blow in
carte, or attempting a desperate thrust. Consequently he did not
attempt to put his bragging threat into practice, for Gilbert was
taller than he, stronger, and more than twenty years younger. Unmailed,
as he stood in his tunic and hose, one vigorous sword-stroke of the
furious boy might break down his guard and cut him half in two. But in
one respect Curboil was mistaken. Gilbert, though young, was one of
those naturally gifted fencers in whom the movements of wrist and arm
are absolutely simultaneous with the perception of the eye, and not
divided by any act of reasoning or thought. In less than half a minute
Sir Arnold knew that he was fighting for his life; the full minute had
not passed before he felt Gilbert's jagged blade deep in the big
muscles of his sword arm, and his own weapon, running past his
adversary, fell from his powerless hand.

In those days it was no shame to strike a disarmed foe, in a duel to
the death. As Sir Arnold felt the rough steel wrenched from the flesh-
wound, he knew that the next stroke would kill him. Quick as light, his
left hand snatched the long dagger from its sheath at his left side,
and Gilbert, raising his blade to strike, felt as if an icicle had
pierced his breast; his arm trembled in the air, and lost its hold upon
the hilt; a scarlet veil descended before his eyes, and the bright
blood gushed from his mouth as he fell straight backward upon the green
turf.