Chapter 17

Now that I had Hilda safe with the archbishop, it mattered nothing to me if all the world knew that I was yet here. So when Ealdwulf, the archbishop himself, asked me to ride with him to Sutton Palace and tell Offa of the finding, I said that I was most willing. I should see Selred, and maybe bring him away with me, and at least could tell him that all was well with Hilda.

I will say now that she was none the worse for the wetting and the rest of last night's doings, but that I saw her come fresh and bright to the breakfast in the little hall of the reeve's house. There she would bide till she could go with the archbishop homewards in some way, most likely from nunnery to nunnery across the land, as ladies will often travel, with parties of the holy women--that is, if Sighard was not to be found. In my own mind I thought that he would not be far off, most likely with Witred, the Mercian thane who had arranged the flight.

Presently, therefore, we rode away from Fernlea toward Sutton, there being but one priest with the archbishop, and six of the townsmen, besides Erling and myself. It was no state visit, but the going of one who would speak with an erring friend in private. Sorely downcast was the good man, for he loved Offa well, and this terrible wrong lay heavily on his heart.

Halfway or so to Sutton we passed the place where trees were thick, and I saw a man lurking among them as if he was watching the road. Wherefore I watched him, and presently saw that he was coming to us, as if half afraid. Somehow the walk and figure of this man seemed known to me, though his face was strange, and I thought that he made for myself. Soon I knew that this was indeed the case; for finding that there were none whom he need fear in the party, the man came boldly from the trees, and, cap in hand, stood by the wayside waiting me.

"Well, friend, what is it?" I asked, as he walked alongside my horse.

He answered in Welsh, and then I knew that he was the guide we had been given last night.

"Jefan ap Huwal the prince sends greeting to the thane on the pied horse, and bids him and the lady come to him if there is need for help. He has heard that the thane serves the Frankish king who hates Saxons beyond the seas, and thinks that mayhap he has foes here in Mercia."

"Thank your prince from me," I answered, after a moment's thought, in which it came to me that no offer of friendship was to be scorned, "and tell him that if need is I will not forget. Tell him also that, thanks to him, the lady is safe and well, and that I have no fear at present."

"That, said Jefan, is what a thane would answer," said the man. "Whereon I was to tell you that yonder evil queen was to be feared the most when she seemed to be the least dangerous. He wits well that she is shut up."

Then it seemed plain that the Welsh prince had spies pretty nearly inside the palace; which is not at all unlikely. However, I said nothing of that, and thanked the man again, looking to see him leave me. The archbishop had ridden on with the rest, for I went slowly, to talk to the Welshman. Still the man did not go, and he had more to say.

"Also I was to tell you that he had a chief of your folk in his hands. But that he deems that he belongs to East Anglia, he would have set him in chains. He is hurt, and is in our camp, free, save for his promise not to escape. His name is Sighard."

"Sighard?" I said. "How came he in your hands?"

"He came over the border, lord, and we had him straightway," said the man simply. "Methinks there were men after him."

"Where is he?" said I, anxiously enough. "He can pay ransom."

"He is ill," said the man; "he cries for his daughter. Jefan thinks that he is that thane whose daughter was in our hands last night with you."

"Ill?" said I; "is he much hurt?"

"There had been a bit of a fight before we took him. One smote him on the helm, and he was stunned. Thereafter he came to himself, and again fell ill. He will mend, for it is naught."

"But where is he?"

"We have many camps, and I cannot tell you. You are a stranger. But, says Jefan the prince, an you will come to him I am to guide you."

Now I was in doubt indeed, for this was a dangerous errand. The man saw that I hesitated, and smiled at me.

"Wise is our prince," he said. "He knew that you would fear to come, therefore he bade me say that you were to mind that once he had you, and set you free, and that he does not go back on his doings, save he must. He has no enmity for the friends of the slain king, but a great hatred for him who slew him."

"Would he not let Sighard the thane come to Fernlea, where his daughter is?"

"Truly, if you will. But it is safer for you to come to him. There Jefan will have all care for all of you until he may send you home. It is told him that Quendritha has sworn the death of four men--of the thane who rides the great pied horse, of his housecarl, of Sighard of Anglia, and of Witred of Bradley, who helped the Anglians to escape."

"How knows he all this? It is more than I have heard--if I have guessed some of it."

The man shrugged his shoulders.

"Thane," he said, with a sidewise smile, "a man who is thrall to a Mercian may yet be a Briton. The Saxon may make a slave of his body, but his heart will be free."

Now I was the more sure that this Welsh prince had some good source of knowledge of what went on inside the palace, and I thought that mayhap he was right. Across the Welsh border might indeed be the safest place for any man who had brought the wrath of the queen on him. I would go to Sighard, and take Hilda with me. One thing I was fairly glad of, and that was that so far as I knew none in all the court of Offa had heard who my folk in Wessex were, else there might be trouble for them; for Quendritha's daughter was not unlike her mother, if all I heard was true.

"Meet me tonight, then," I said. "I will go to Jefan, and will bring the lady."

"You do well," he answered gravely. "I will meet you somewhere on the westward track, a mile from Fernlea ford. You shall but ride on till I come. You shall choose your own time, for I cannot tell what may stay you. I have naught to do but wait. If you meet other Britons, tell them that you seek the prince, and they will pass you on. If so be you come not tonight, I will wait for another, and yet another. After that--"

"If we do not come, what then?"

"Doubtless we shall burn Sutton walls. A curse lies thereon now, and it may be that we shall wreak it."

With that he leaped across the brook which ran by the road, and passed into shelter. Then I turned to Erling, who waited for me across the road, and asked if he had understood what was said.

"Ay, all," he answered. "It is good enough; otherwise I might have put in a word. This Jefan has the name for an honest man, as I have ever heard."

"The one thing about it that I mislike is that we seem to be running away from hearsay," I said.

"Mighty little hearsay was that which set Sighard flying across the border, I take it," Erling answered. "Seeing that you have no more to keep you here, it is about time we went also. We have foes we cannot see, and are in a land of which we know not a foot. Jefan will help us to ken the foe, and will guide us when we need it."

Now of all things which I had in my mind, the first seemed to me to be that I must ride eastward with Hilda and see the mother of the slain king, to give what account I might of that charge she had laid on me. But if Sighard had been prevented from getting homeward, it was certain that so should I. Wherefore we should not be watched for on any westward road, and that way, at least, was open. Thence we might find our way when the days wore on and Sighard could travel. That remained to be seen; and, take it all round, I was more easy than I had been.

So also seemed the archbishop presently, when I told him the message I had had. And he agreed with us that we might do worse than go to Jefan at once with Hilda; matters being as they were, it was not safe in Mercia.

"He is a good prince and honourable," he said; "and if I say that, I speak of one who is the foe of our folk. He has suffered much from us, and has cause for enmity with Offa--and maybe with Quendritha. I can say plainly now that her restless longing for power has kept our armies busy many a time when they had been better at rest."

He sighed; and then came somewhat which turned our thoughts, and no more was said at the time, either of Quendritha or of my doings. For now we were in sight of the palace on its little hill, and from its gates came toward us a train of folk, guarded by men of Offa's own housecarls in front and rear, as if those who travelled were no common wayfarers. In the midst of all was a closed horse litter, beside which rode two or three veiled and hooded ladies and a priest. Save the captain of the guards, there was no thane with the party, and but a few pack horses followed them, and I thought it would be some abbess, perhaps, who was leaving the palace.

We drew up on the roadside to let this train pass, though I suppose that by all right the archbishop might have claimed the crown of the way for himself, had he been other than the humble-minded man that he was. As the leading guards passed us they saluted in all due form; and then one of the ladies knew who was here, and bent to the litter, and so turned and spoke to the captain, who straightway called a halt, and came, helm in hand, to the archbishop, praying him to speak with the lady who was in his charge.

Who this was I did not hear, but I saw the face of the good man change, and he hurried to dismount and go to the litter. And thence, after a word or two had passed, came the priest I had seen; and when he uncowled I knew him for my friend Selred, and glad I was to see him.

"Why, how goes it, father?" I said, as my hand met his. "You were not in the wood of our tryst, and I feared that you were in trouble."

Very gravely he shook his head, looking sadly at me.

"There is naught but trouble in all this place," he said. "I could not come to you, for the gates were closed early, that Gymbert might be taken. He was not taken. And yet I have heavier trouble to tell you than you can think."

"No, father," I said quickly, seeing that he had learned too little, and doubtless believed Hilda either drowned or else in the hands of Gymbert and his men--whichever tale Quendritha had been told or chose to tell him.

"I was in the wood, and thither came the lady we ken of when she was set forth from the place. I was in time to get her away, and she is safe."

It was wonderful to see the face of the chaplain lighten at this.

"Laus Deo," he said under his breath, and his hand sought mine again and gripped it. "That is a terrible load off my heart," he said. "Yet I have heard that our good Sighard is slain. They have burned the hall of honest Witred over his head, and he is gone, and it was said that Sighard fell there with him."

"It is not half an hour ago that I heard how he fled to the west, where the Welsh saved him, for hatred of Offa and pity for the betrayed Anglian king. He is safe, if a little hurt."

Now the horse of Erling reared suddenly, and I looked up. It was still in a moment, and he spoke to it without heeding me. But as soon as he caught my eye when I first turned, he set his hand carelessly across his lips, and I knew what he meant. I had better say no more of where Sighard was or how I hoped to see him.

So I said what I had to tell him of the finding of the king, and how we had come to tell Offa thereof; and as he heard, Selred the chaplain knelt there by the roadside and gave thanks openly, with the tears of joy in his eyes. The rough housecarls heard also, and there went a word or two among them; and their grim faces lightened, for one shame, at least, had been taken from the house of their master.

Now there was a sound as of a woman's weeping from the litter, and Selred heard it and rose to his feet.

"It is Etheldrida the princess," he whispered to me. "She is flying to some far nunnery--mayhap to Crowland--that there she may end her days in what peace she may find. It is well, for here with her mother is but terror for her."

The archbishop signed to me, and I went to the side of that litter, unhelming, while Erling took my horse's bridle. There I knelt on one knee, and waited for what I was to hear. It was a little while before that came, but the sobs were at length stilled. I heard one of the ladies, who were those who came from East Anglia, say to the other that it was good that she had wept at last.

And presently from behind the curtains of the litter the princess spoke to me, very low, and I do not think any other heard.

"Good friend of him whom I loved, I thank you for your loyalty to him. The archbishop has told me, and you have given me back a little of my trust in men. I had deemed that all were false for aye, but for you, I think. Now I go hence, and beyond the walls of some nunnery I shall never pass, and there I will pray for you also. And for you there shall be happy days to come, in the meed of utmost loyalty."

I could not answer her, and still I knelt, for there was somewhat needed to come ere I could part from her without a word. But before I could frame aught she set her hand through the curtains, and in it was somewhat small, as it were a silken case cunningly woven round a little jewel, perchance.

"There was none whom I would ask to do what I longed for," she said; "but now it will be done. I pray you set this on his heart, that it may go to his grave with him."

"There it shall most surely be, lady," I said. "I am honoured in the duty."

"Go!" she said faintly; "and farewell."

I rose up hastily, and went back to my horse, while the lady who had spoken just now busied herself in caring for her mistress. Selred took my arm and walked aside with me.

"You must not come back to East Anglia," he said. "I know that you would fain see the lady of Thetford, but it were useless danger for you. I will tell her all that you have done, now; and if in after days you may come to us, do so. Bide and tend Sighard and Hilda, and mind that there is sore peril to both of them so long as Quendritha lives. She is shut up now, but all the more has her mind freedom to plan and plot the fall of those who have seen her at her worst. One cannot shut up such a woman as she, but she will have her ways of learning all she will, and her tools are many."

"I would that you could bide here," I said.

"I also; but I must pass eastward with this poor lady and these others. Yet I am sure that Offa will do all honour to our king. He has been seen by none as yet save his pages. They whisper that he is fasting, and bowed with shame and grief."

For a little longer we spoke, and then we must part. The sad train of the princess went on, and swung into the eastward track which she would take, and the archbishop signed to us to follow him. And that was the last which any man in Mercia saw of the fair princess who had been the pride of the land, for she came safely to far Crowland, in the fenland, and there pined and died.

It is said that the parting between her and her terrible mother was such that men will tell little thereof. I know that in that time some strange gift of prophecy came over the maiden, and she foretold the death of her who planned the deed, even to the day, and the awesome manner of it; and that also she wept for the knowledge given her that the deed should bring the end of the line of Offa and the fall of Mercia--things which no man could think possible at this time, so that she seemed to rave. More things strange and terrible, I heard also, but them I will not set down. Mayhap they were not true.

Now we went on slowly up the hill, and at last rode into the gates. There men loitered idly, as yesterday; for the head of the house sat silent and moody in his chamber, and none had orders for aught. Across the court we went to the priests' lodgings, and thence came the chaplains to meet their lord, and with him I was taken into the house.

"I have come to see the king," said the archbishop; "take me to him straightway."

"He will see none," they said; "it is his word that no man shall disturb him."

"If he will hear what shall make his heart less heavy, he will see me," said the archbishop. "Tell him that I have news for him. Or stay; I will go to him myself."

The priests looked at one another, but they could not stop their lord; and with a sign to us to follow, he passed across the court again, up the long hall, and so into the council chamber. At the door which led to Offa's apartments there was a young thane on guard, but no others were to be seen. I suppose that never before had Offa been so ill attended, for the very courtiers feared what curse should light on the place and all who bided in it.

"Tell your lord that I demand audience with him," said the archbishop to this thane. "The matter will not wait; it is urgent."

The youth rose and bowed, and passed within the door. In a moment or two he was back again, throwing the door open for us.

"Yourself and no other, lord," he said.

"I take these two," answered Ealdwulf the archbishop. "I will answer to the king for their presence."

So we two, Erling and I, followed him into the chamber of the king; and with my first glance at Offa there fell on me a great pity for him.

He sat at a great heavy table in a carven chair, leaning his crossed arms before him on the board, and staring at naught with hollow, black-ringed eyes, as of sleeplessness and grief. His face was wan and drawn, so that he seemed ten years or more older than when last he sat in hall with us; and he was clad in the same clothes which he wore when he came forth to us on the morning of terror. None had dared to touch aught in his room; and bent and soiled among the rushes on the floor lay the little gold crown which he wore at the last feast, as if he had swept it from the table out of his sight, and had spurned it from him thereafter in some fit of passion. Hard by that lay a broken sword, and its hilt flashed and sparkled with the gems I had noted in the hall. It was his own.

On the table was neither wine nor food, but there was a great book, silver covered and golden lettered, and it was open at a place where a wondrous picture in many hues showed a king who seemed to humble himself in fear before a long-robed man priestlike.

He did not stir when we came in, nor did he say a word. Only he looked at Ealdwulf, as it were blindly, waiting what he should hear from his lips. And into his look there crept somewhat like fear.

But there was naught terrible or hard in the face which he looked on; it had but deepest sorrow and pity.

"My king," said Ealdwulf, seeing that he must needs speak first, "here is one who has a word for you. I think that you will be glad to hear it. Know you where the body of Ethelbert was hidden?"

"No," said the king in a dull voice. "My men search even now. It is all that I can do."

Then Ealdwulf bade me tell the story of the finding, and I did so. Yet the look of Offa never brightened as he heard, nor did he ask me one question.

"It is well," he said, when I had no more to say, and his fingers moved restlessly on the table.

But he did not look in my face, nor had he done so since I came before him. I stood back, and Ealdwulf was alone near him.

"My son," said the old man, "my son, this has not been your doing. I will not believe that."

Offa set his hand on the great book with its picture.

"As much my doing as the slaying of the Hittite by David the king. It was planned, and I hindered it not."

Then he set his hands to his face, and his voice softened. And at that I passed silently from the room, leaving those two together, for this was not a meeting in which I had wish to meddle. Erling came with me, and we sat in the council chamber for half an hour, waiting.

Presently--after the young thane had told us how that Quendritha was closely guarded, and that the voice of all blamed her utterly for every wrong that had been wrought in Mercia for many a long year, now that the fear of her was somewhat passed--Erling rose up.

"With your leave, thane," he said to me, "we have a few things left here, and our other horses still stand in the stable. It is in my mind to see what I can take back with me."

We went out together, for the stillness and waiting grew wearisome. There were none of the pleasant sounds of the household at work or sport in all the palace. It was as a place stricken with some plague.

So we passed through the church to our lodging, and took our few goods, and Sighard's, and so went with them to the long stables where our two spare horses stood in idleness. The rows of stalls were well-nigh empty now, those who had gone having taken their steeds.

"I wonder ours are left," quoth Erling. "These Mercians are more honest than some folk I know."

He called the grooms, and we made ready, taking the horses out to where the folk of the archbishop waited in the sunny courtyard, and there leaving them. Then we went back to the council chamber, and again waited for what seemed a long time. The young thane had a meal brought for us there.

Presently Ealdwulf himself came to the door and called me softly, and I followed him back to the presence of the king. I cannot tell what had passed between those two, nor do I suppose that any man will ever know; but Offa was more himself, save that on his face was a deep sadness, and no trace of hardness or pride therewith.

"Friend," he said, "is it your duty to go back to Carl the Great?"

"I have left his service, King Offa; I am on my way homeward. It was but by the kindness of Ethelbert, to whom I helped bear messages, that I came hither."

"Well," he said, "I will not hinder you. Had you gone back, I would have asked you to tell him plainly all of this. As it is, Ealdwulf shall send churchmen to tell him; I would have him know the truth. Now I must thank you for this that you did last night, and tell you what shall be done in atonement for the death of your friend."

There he checked himself and bit his lip.

"Nay," he said unsteadily, "there is no atonement possible. There is but left to me the power of showing that I do repent, and will have all men know it for aye. There shall be at Fernlea, where he will lie in his last sleep, the greatest cathedral that has been seen or heard of in this land, and men shall hail him as the very saint that you and I knew him to be; and after his name shall it be called, and in it shall be all due service of priest and choir for him till time shall end it. What more may I do?"

"I think that the place where his body lay should not be left unmarked," I said boldly, for so it had seemed to me. "May not somewhat be done there, that the spot may be kept?"

"Ay, at Marden," he said eagerly, as if he did but long to do all that he might, "there also shall be a church, that it may be held holy for all time. It shall be seen to at once."

After that promise Offa bade me farewell sadly enough, and I was glad to leave the chamber. Nor had we long to wait before Ealdwulf came out, and we were once more turning our backs on the palace of Sutton. On its walls I never set eyes again, nor did I wish to do so.

As we went in leisurely wise back to Fernlea, the archbishop told me those few things which I have set down concerning the way in which Quendritha had beguiled the king into suffering the thought of this deed of shame. No more than was needful for me to understand how little part, indeed, Offa had had in the matter did he tell me, for all else that had passed between those two was not to be told. Both he and I think that had the evil queen left the doing of her deed until morning it had never been wrought, for Offa would have come to himself.

Yet one cannot tell. What Quendritha had set her heart on was apt to be carried through, even to the bitterest of endings for those who were in her way thereto. How she would fare now Ealdwulf could not tell me. It was true that she was almost imprisoned, as I have said, but none could tell whether that would last. Yet he thought, indeed, that Offa would have no more to do with her.

So we came back to Fernlea, and when I saw the little church I minded once more that strange dream of the poor young king's. I had heard the words which told that it would come to pass. Nor was there any doubt now in my mind that all those things which we had deemed omens were indeed so. The fears we had tried to laugh at were more than justified.