Gil Couteau sat in the warm sunlight of the courtyard industriously polishing his long, straight sword. It was a good sword, he ruminated, scraping industriously at the dark stain which insisted on sticking in the crevices of the scrollwork hilt, but it was becoming thirsty from lack of use. His superstitious eye seemed to detect some subtle lessening of the keenness of the edge; some slight dullness in the polish of the blade since he had used it almost daily against the cursed Saracens in Palestine.