gentleman, for my armor and weapons, and meet him there again, to die by
his hand. So shrive me quick, Sir Priest."

Hereward knelt down. Martin Lightfoot knelt down by him, and with a
trembling voice began to interpret for him.

"What does he say?" asked Hereward, as the priest murmured something to
himself.

"He said," quoth Martin, now fairly blubbering, "that, fair and young as
you are, your shrift should be as short and as clean as David's."

Hereward was touched. "Anything but that," said he, smiting on his breast,
"Mea culpa,--mea culpa,--mea maxima culpa."

"Tell him how I robbed my father."

The priest groaned as Martin did so.

"And how I mocked at my mother, and left her in a rage, without ever a
kind word between us. And how I have slain I know not how many men in
battle, though that, I trust, need not lay heavily on my soul, seeing that
I killed them all in fair fight."

Again the priest groaned.

"And how I robbed a certain priest of his money and gave it away to my
housecarles."

Here the priest groaned more bitterly still.