Now I halted before I lifted my head above the skyline, and
listened with a fear on me lest I should hear the sound of running
feet, and I was the more careful because I knew that the snow which
lay white and deep on all the open land might deaden any sounds
thereof. But I heard nothing save the wail of the wind overhead as
it rose in gusts. I wondered if Thorgils would be able to bide in
this little cove, or must needs put out to seek some other haven.
There seemed to be a swell setting into it.
So I crept yet farther up the path, crouching behind a point of
rock, and thence I saw a dark line on the snow that seemed to
promise a road, and that must surely lead to some house or village.
I went forward to it with all caution, and with my head over my
shoulder, as they say, but I saw no man. This track led east and
west, and was well trodden by cattle, but there were few footprints
of men on it, so far as I could see. So I turned into it, going
ever away from the ship, and hurrying. I had a thought that I heard
shouts behind me, but there was more wind here on the heights than
I had felt on the sea, or it was rising, and it sung strangely
round the bare points of rock that jutted up everywhere. Maybe it
was but that.
Inland I could see no sign of house or hut where I might find food
at least, but the cloud wrack had drifted across the moon, and I
could not see far now. It was a desolate coast, all unlike our own.
Then I came to a place where the track crossed stony ground and was
lost in gathered snow. When I was across that I had lost the road
altogether, and had only the line of the cliffs to guide me to what
shelter I could not tell. And now a few flakes of snow fluttered
round me, and I held on hopelessly, thinking that surely I should
come to some place that would give me a lee of rock that I could
creep under.
Then the snow swooped down on me heavily, with a whirl and rush of
wind from the sea, and I tried to hurry yet more from the chill.
Then I was sure that I heard voices calling after me, and I ran,
not rightly knowing where to go, but judging that the coastline
would lead me to some fishers' village in the end. There seemed no
hope from the land I had seen.
Again the voices came--nay, but there was one voice only, and it
called me by my name: "Oswald, Oswald!"
I stopped and listened, for I thought of Thorgils. But the voice
was silent, and again I pressed on in the blinding snow, and at
once it came, wailing:
"Oswald, Oswald!"
It was behind me now and close at hand, and I turned with my hand
on my sword hilt. But there was nothing. Only the snow whirled
round me, and the wind sung in the rocks. I called softly, but
there was no answer, and I was called no more as I stood still.
"Oswald, Oswald!"
I had turned to go on my way when it came this time, and now I
could have sworn that I knew the voice, though whose it was I could
not say.
"Who calls me," I cried, facing round.
Then a chill that was not of cold wind and snow fell on me, for
there was silence, and into my mind crept the knowledge of where I
had last heard that voice. It was long years ago--at Eastdean in
half-forgotten Sussex.
"Father!" I cried. "Father!"
There was no reply, and I stood there for what seemed a long time
waiting one. I called again and again in vain.
"It is weakness," I said to myself at last, and turned.
At once the voice was wailing, with some wild terror as it seemed,
at my very shoulder, with its cry of my name, and I must needs turn
once more sharply:
"Oswald, Oswald!"
My foot struck a stone as I wheeled round, and it grated on others
and seemed to stop. But as I listened for the voice I heard a
crash, and yet another, and at last a far-off rumble that was below
my very feet, and I sprang with a cry away from the sound, for I
knew that I stood on the very brink of some gulf. And then the snow
ceased for a moment and the moon shone out from the break in the
clouds, and I saw that my last footprint whence the voice had made
me turn was on the edge of an awesome rift that cleft the level
surface on the downland, clean cut as by a sword stroke, right
athwart my path. Even in clear daylight I had hardly seen that gulf
until I was on its very brink, for I could almost have leapt it,
and nought marked its edge. And in its depths I heard the crash and
thunder of prisoned waves.
I do not know that I ever felt such terror as fell on me then. It
was the terror that comes of thinking what might have been, after
the danger is past, and that is the worst of all. I sank down on
the snow with my knees trembling, and I clutched at the grass that
I might not feel that I must even yet slip into that gulf that was
so close, though there was no slope of the ground toward it. Sheer
and sudden it gaped with sharp edges, as the mouth of some monster
that waited for prey.
There on the snow I believe that I should have bided to sleep the
sleep of the frozen, for I hardly dared to move. The snow whirled
round me again, but I did not heed it, and with a great roar the
wind rose and swept up the rift with a sound as of mighty harps,
but it did not rouse me. Only my father's voice came to me again
and called me, and I rose up shaking and followed it as it came
from time to time, until I was once more on the track that I had
lost.
There it left me, but the sadness that had been in its tones was
gone when it last came. And surely that was the touch of no
snowflake that lit on my hand for a moment and was gone.
Now I grew stronger, and the fear of the unseen was no longer on
me, and I battled onward with wind and snow for a long way. Thanks
to the wind, the track was kept clear of the snow, and I did not
lose it again until it led me to help that was unlooked for.
There came the sound of a bell to me, strange sounding indeed, but
a bell nevertheless, and I knew that somewhere close at hand was
surely some home of monks who would take me in with all kindness.
And presently the track led me nearer to the sound of the sea, and
at last bent sharply to the right and began to go downhill, while
the sound of the bell grew plainer above the roar of nearer
breakers yet. I felt that I was passing down such a gorge as that
up which I had come from the boat, but far narrower, for I had not
gone far before I could touch the rocky walls with either hand.
Then I came to steps, and they were steep, but below me still
sounded the bell, and the hoarse breakers were very near at hand. I
expected to see the lights of some little fishing village every
moment, but the wind that rushed up the narrow space between the
cliff walls and brought the salt spray with it almost blinded me.
Suddenly the stairway turned so sharply that I almost fell, and
then I found my way downward barred by what seemed a great
rough-faced rock that was right across the gorge, if one may call a
mere cleft in the cliffs so, and barred my way, while the strange
bell sounded from beyond it. But it was sheltered under this
barrier, and I felt along it to find out where I had to climb over,
thinking that the stairway must lead up its face. But there was no
stair, and as I groped my hand came on cut stone, and when I felt
it I knew that I had come to a doorway, for I found the woodwork,
but in no way could I find how it opened.
I kicked on it, therefore, and shouted, but it seemed that none
heard. The bell went on and then stopped, and I thought I heard
footsteps on the far side of the barrier. They came nearer, and
then were almost at the door, paused for a moment, and then the
door was opened and the red light from a fire flashed out on me,
showing the tall form of a man in monk's dress in its opening.
"Come in, my son," said a grave voice, speaking Welsh, that had no
wonder in it, though one could hardly have expected to see an armed
and gold-bedecked Saxon here in the storm.
I stumbled into what I had thought a rock, and found when my eyes
grew used to the light that I was in a house built of great stones,
uncemented but wonderfully fitted together, and warm and bright
with the driftwood fire, though I heard the spray rattle on the
roof of flat stones, and the wind howled strangely around the
walls. Both ends of this house were of the living rock of the sides
of the gorge, and at one end seemed to be a sort of cave with a
narrow entrance.
The man who had bidden me in stood yet at the open door looking out
on his staircase, but he did not bide there long. With a sigh he
turned and closed the door and came in, hardly looking at me, but
turning toward the cave I had just noticed. He was an old man, very
old indeed, with a long white beard and pale face lined with
countless wrinkles, and he stooped a little as he walked. But his
face was calm and kind, though he did not smile at me, and I felt
that here I was safe with one of no common sort.
"Come, my son," he said, "it is the hour of prime. Glad am I to
have one with me after many days."
He waited for no answer, and I followed him for the few steps that
led to the rock cavern; and there was a tiny oratory with its altar
and cross, and wax lights already burning.
The old man knelt in his place and I knelt with him, and as he
began the office straightway I knew how worn out I was, and of a
sudden the lights danced before me and I reeled and fell with a
clatter and clash of arms on the rocky floor. I seemed to know that
the old man turned and looked and rose up from his knees hastily,
and I tried to say that I was sorry that I had broken the peace of
this holy place; but he answered in his soft voice:
"Why, poor lad, I should have seen that you were spent ere this.
The fault is mine."
He raised me gently, and seemed to search me for some wound. And as
he did so I came more to myself, and begged him to go on with his
office.
"First comes care of the afflicted, my son, and after that may be
prayer. In truth, to help the fainting is in itself a prayer, as I
think. Come to the fireside and tell me what is amiss."
"Fasting and fighting and freezing, father," I said, trying to
laugh.
"Are you wounded?" he asked quickly.
"No, not at all."
"That is well. It is a brave heart that will jest in such a case as
yours, for you are ice from head to foot. Well, I had better hear
your story, if you will tell it me, in the daylight. Now get those
wet garments off you and put on this. I will get you food, and you
shall sleep."
This was surely the last place where my foes would think of looking
for me, and the snow would hide every trace of my path. So I made
no delay, but took off my byrnie and garments. There was a pool on
the floor where I stood, for it was true enough that I had been ice
covered. Then I put on a rough warm brown frock with a cord round
the waist, so that I looked like a lay brother at Glastonbury, and
all the while I waxed more and more sleepy with the comfort of the
place. But I wiped my arms carefully while the old priest was busy
with a cauldron over the fire, and we were ready at the same time.
Then I had a meal of some sort of stew that seemed the best I ever
tasted, and a long draught of good mead, while the host looked on
in grave content. And then he spread a heap of dry seaweed in a
corner near the fire, and blessed me and bid me sleep. Nor did I
need a second bidding, and I do not think that I can have stirred
from the time that I lay down to the moment when I woke with a
feeling on me that it was late in the daylight.
So it was, and I looked round for my kind host, but he was not to
be seen. Outside the wind was still strong, but not what it had
been, for the gale was sinking suddenly as it rose, and into the
one little window the sun shone brightly enough now and then as the
clouds fled across it. There was a bright fire on the hearth, and
over it hung a cauldron, whence steam rose merrily, and it was
plain that my friend of last night was not far off, so I lay still
and waited his return.
Then my eyes fell on my clothes and arms as they hung from pegs in
the walls over against me, and it seemed as if the steel of mail
and helm and sword had been newly burnished. Then I saw also that a
rent in my tunic, made when my horse fell, had been carefully
mended, and that no speck of the dust and mire I had gathered on my
garments from collar to hose was left. All had been tended as
carefully as if I had been at home, and I saw Elfrida's little
brooch shining where I had pinned it.
That took me back to Glastonbury in a moment, but I had to count
before I could be sure that it was but a matter of hours since I
took that gift in the orchard, rather than of months. And I
wondered if Owen knew yet that I was lost, or if my men sought me
still. Then my mind went to Evan, the chapman outlaw, and I thought
that by this time he would have given me up, and would be far away
by now, beyond the reach of Thorgils and his wrath.
Now the seaward door opened, and a swirl of spray from the breakers
on the rocks came in with my host, who set a great armful of drift
wood on the floor, closed it, and so turned to me.
"Good morrow, my son," he said. "How fare you after rest?"
"Well as can be, father," I answered, sitting up. "Stiff I am, and
maybe somewhat black and blue, but that is all. I have no hurt. But
surely I have slept long?"
"A matter of ten hours, my son, and that without stirring. You
needed it sorely, so I let you be. Now it is time for food, but
first you shall have a bath, and that will do wonders with the
soreness."
Thankful enough was I of the great tub of hot water he had ready
for me, and after it and a good meal I was a new man. My host said
nought till I had finished, and then it was I who broke the silence
between us.
"Father," I said, "I have much to thank you for. What may I call
you?"
"They name me Govan the Hermit, my son."
"I do not know how to say all I would, Father Govan," I went on,
"but I was in a sore strait last night, and but for your bell I
think I must have perished in the snow, or in some of the clefts of
these cliffs."
"I rang the bell for you, my son, though I knew not why. It came on
me that one was listening for some sign of help in the storm."
"How could you know?" I asked in wonder.
Govan shook his head.
"I cannot tell. Men who bide alone as I bide have strange bodings
in their solitude. I have known the like come over me before, and
it has ever been a true warning."
Now it was my turn to be silent, for all this was beyond me. I had
heard of hermits before, but had never seen one. If all were like
this old man, too much has not been said of their holiness and
nearness to unseen things.
So for a little while we sat and looked into the fire, each on a
three-legged stool, opposite one another. Then at last he asked,
almost shyly, and as if he deemed himself overbold, how it was that
I had come to be on the cliffs. That meant in the end that he heard
all my story, of course, but my Welsh halted somewhat for want of
use, and it was troublesome to tell it. However, he heard me with
something more than patience, and when I ended he said:
"Now I know how it is that a Saxon speaks the tongue of Cornwall
here in Dyfed. You have had a noble fostering, Thane, for even here
we lamented for the loss of Owen the prince. We have seen him in
Pembroke in past years. You will be most welcome there with this
news, for Howel, our prince, loved him well. They are akin,
moreover. It will be well that you should go to him for help."
He rose up and went to the seaward door again, and I followed him
out. The sea was but just below us, for the tide was full, and the
breakers were yet thundering at the foot of the cliffs on either
hand. But I did not note that at first, for the thing which held my
eyes at once was a ship which was wallowing and plunging past us
eastward, under close reefed sail, and I knew her for the vessel in
which I had crossed. Thorgils had left the cove, and was making for
Tenby while he might. I should have to seek him there.
"How far is it to the Danes' town, Father Govan?" I asked. "Yonder
goes my friend's ship."
"Half a day's ride, my son, and with peril for you all the way. Our
poor folk would take you for a Dane in those arms, and you have no
horse. Needs must that you seek Howel, and he will give you a guard
willingly."
Then he turned toward a great rock that lay on the beach, as if it
had fallen from the cliffs that towered above us.
"Here is the bell that you heard last night," he said.
He took a rounded stone that lay on the rock and struck it, and I
knew that the clear bell note that it gave out was indeed that
which had been my saving.
"Once I had a bell in the cote on the roof yonder," he said, "but
the Danes caught sight of it when they first passed this way, and
took it from me. Then as I sorrowed that the lonely shepherds and
fishers might no more hear its call, I seemed to see a vision of an
angel who bade me see what had been sent me instead. And when I
went out as the vision bade me, I could see nought but this rock
newly fallen, and was downcast. And so, from the cliff rolled a
little stone and smote it, and it rang, and I knew the gift. To my
hearing it has a sweeter voice than the bell made with hands."
Then he showed me his well, roofed in with flat stones because the
birds would wash in it, and so close to the sea salt that it seemed
altogether wonderful that the water was fresh and sweet. And then I
saw that the cell did indeed stretch from side to side of the
narrow cleft down which I had come, so that each end of the
building was of living rock.
"I built it with my own hands, my son," he said. "I cannot tell how
long ago that was, for time is nought to me, but it was many years.
Once I wore arms and had another name, but that also I care not to
recall."
Then there came footsteps from above us, and looking up I saw a man
in a rough fisher's dress coming in haste down the long flight of
rock-hewn steps that led from the cliff top down the cleft to the
door that I had found last night, and soon we heard him calling to
the hermit.
Govan left me, and went through the cell to speak with him, but was
back very shortly.
"Howel the prince is coming hither," he said. "The man you saw has
seen him on the way, and came to warn me to be at hand for him. It
is well for you, my son, as I am sure."
So we went together into the house, and I thought to arm myself,
but Govan smiled and asked me not to do so, saying that hither even
Howel would come without his weapons, in all likelihood.
I understood him, and did but see that my sword was in reach before
I sat down and waited for the coming of the Welsh prince, and I
thought that all I need ask him was for help to reach Tenby,
whither Thorgils must have gone. It was quite likely that Evan
might have raised the country against me in hopes of taking me
again. And maybe I would ask for justice on the said Evan. Also I
wanted to hear what had happened after my going.
It was not long that I had to wait. There came the tramp of horses
at the top of the gorge, and the sound of a voice or two, and then
the tread of an armed man came slowly down the stair, and Govan
went to meet him. I rose and waited for his entry.
Now there came in, following Govan, unhelmed as he had greeted the
holy man, a handsome, middle-aged warrior, black haired and eyed
and active looking. He wore the short heavy sword of the Roman
pattern, gold hilted and scabbarded, at his side, and the helm he
carried had a high plumed crest and hanging side pieces that seemed
like those pictured on the walls of Gerent's palace. He had no body
armour on, and his dress was plain enough, of white woollen stuff
with broad crimson borders, but round his neck was a wonderful
twisted collar of gold, and heavy golden bracelets rang as his arms
moved. I saw that his first glance went to me, and that his face
changed when he saw that I was not one of his own people, but a
foreigner, as he would hold me. I saw too that he noted my arms as
they hung on the wall behind me.
Govan saw it also, and made haste to tell him who I was.
"This is one who should be welcome to you, Prince, for the sake of
old days, for he has come by mischance from Dyvnaint, being foster
son of one of the princes of Gerent's court, though a Saxon by
birth. Nevertheless he speaks our tongue well. He will tell you all
that presently, and I think that he needs your help."
"I thought you one of our troublesome neighbours, the Danes," he
said, with a smile now in place of the look of doubt. "But if you
are from Dyvnaint there are many things that you can tell me. But I
have come here to see that all is well with Father Govan, for there
is talk of a mad Norseman who is roving the country, unless the
cold has ended him in the night. It is good to see that nought is
wrong here."
Now I stood apart, and Govan and his guest spoke together for a few
moments before my turn to tell Howel of my plight should come, and
almost the next thing that the prince said made me wonder that I
had not thought who he was at once. Of course, he was the father of
the kindly princess who had crossed the sea with Thorgils, and had
so nearly been the means of my earlier rescue.
"Nona, my daughter, is here at the cliff top, Father Govan," Howel
said. "She came home in the Norse ship last night, as we planned;
but tide failed for Tenby, and it chanced that the ship had to put
in at the old landing place. Now she wants to thank you for your
prayers for her, and also to beg them for some sick man about whom
she is troubling herself--some poor hurt knave of a trader who
crossed in the ship with her."
"I will go out and speak with her," Govan said, smiling. "It is
ever her way to think of the troubled."
"Tell her that I will not keep her long in the cold," Howel said.
"Bid her keep her horse walking, lest he take chill, if I may ask
as much, Father."
Govan threw his cowl over his head, and answered:
"I will tell her. Now, Prince, this friend of mine has come here in
a strange way, and I think he needs help that you can give him."
He passed out of the cliffward door and went his way up the long
stairway. Then Howel asked me how he could help me.
"Tell me about Dyvnaint also, for when I was a boy I was long at
Gerent's court. Did not Govan say that you were fostered by one of
the princes? It is likely that I knew your foster father well, if
so; was he Morgan?"
"Not Morgan, but Owen," I answered, and at that Howel almost
started to his feet.
"Owen!" he cried. "Does he yet live? Surely we all thought him
dead, or else he had come hither to us when he was banished. I
loved him well in the old days, and glad I am that you are not
Morgan's charge. Tell me all about Owen. Is he home again?"
"Morgan is dead," I answered, feeling that here I had met with a
friend in all certainty. "And because of that, Owen is in his place
again, and I am here. It has all happened in this week, and to tell
you of it is to tell you all my trouble."
Now he was all impatience to hear, and I told him all that needed
to be told, until I came to the time when Owen was back at Norton
with the old king. Then he asked me some questions about matters
there, and in the midst of my answers sprang up.
"Why," he cried, "here I have forgotten the girl, and she ought to
be hearing all this, instead of sitting in the cold on the cliff.
She is Owen's goddaughter, moreover, and he was here only a little
time before he was banished. She can remember him well."
"Stay, though," he said, sitting down again. "There is your own
tale yet. Let us hear it. Maybe that is not altogether so
pleasant."
My own thought was that I was glad I might tell it without the
wondering eyes of the fair princess on me, being afraid in a sort
of way of having her think of me as the helpless sick man she had
pitied. So I hastened to tell all that story.
And when I came to the way in which Evan brought me, Howel's eyes
flashed savagely, and a black scowl came over his handsome face,
sudden as a thunderstorm in high summer.
"It will be a short shrift and a long rope for that Evan when I
catch him," he said. "He comes here every year, and I suppose that
the goods I have had from him at times have been plunder. I would
that you had ended him last night. Now he has got away in peace,
and is out of my reach, maybe, by this time. Well, how went it?"
Then I told him the end of the tale, wondering how it was that
Thorgils had let him go. I asked the prince if he could explain
that for me.
"Not altogether," he said. "Evan sent to me to ask me for men to
guard the ship presently, after we began the feast, saying that he
was going ashore with his goods, and was responsible to the
shipmaster. I told Thorgils, and he said it was well. So I sent a
guard, and presently Evan came and spoke with Thorgils for a little
while, and drank a cup of wine, and so went his way. Next morning,
before he sailed, Thorgils came and grumbled about the loss of his
boat, saying that Evan had taken some sick friend of his ashore in
her, and that she had not come back. I paid him for it too, because
I like the man, and so does my daughter. He sailed, and then I
heard of the fight for the first time."
Howel laughed a little to himself.
"Master Evan must have paid my rascals well to keep up the story of
the sick man to Thorgils, for he said nothing to me of any fight.
Maybe, however, he never spoke to any of them, and it is likely
that they would not say much to him. And now, by the Round Table!
if you are not the mad Norseman they prated of to me when I wanted
to know who slew the two men, and if you are not the sick man that
Nona is so anxious about! Here, she must come and see you!"
With that he got up and went to the door before I could stay him,
and called gaily to the princess, whose horse I could hear stamping
high above us.
"Ho, Nona, here is a friend of yours whom you will be glad to see.
Ask Father Govan to let you come hither, and bid the men take your
horse."
So I must make the best of it, and I will say that I felt foolish
enough. It was in my mind, though, that I owed many thanks to the
princess for all her kind thought for me as sick man. I had already
said as much to Howel. So I began to try to frame some sort of
speech for her. One never remembers how such speeches always fail
at the pinch.
The light footsteps came down the steps in no long time, and then
the princess entered, dressed much as yesterday, with a bright
colour from the wind, and looking round to see the promised friend.
"I have kept you long, daughter," Howel said, taking her hand, "but
I have been hearing good news. Here is Oswald of Wessex, a king's
thane, but more than that to us, for he is the adopted son of your
own godfather, Owen of Cornwall, and he brings the best of tidings
of him."
Now the maiden's face flushed with pleasure, and she held out her
hand to me in frank welcome. Yet I saw a little wondering look on
her face as she let her eyes linger on mine for a moment, and that
puzzled me.
"You are most welcome, Thane," she said. "It is a wonderful thing
that here I should learn that my lost godfather yet lives. You will
come to Pembroke with us, and tell me of him there?"
Then Howel laughed as if he had a jest that would not keep, and he
cried: "Why, Nona, that is a mighty pretty speech, but surely one
asks a sick man of his health first."
She blushed a little, and glanced again at me.
"Surely the thane is not hurt?" she said.
"Yesterday he was, and that sorely. What was it, Thane?--Slipped
shoulder, broken thigh, and broken jaw? All of which a certain
maiden pitied most heartily, even to lending a blanket to the poor
man."
Then Nona blushed red, and I made haste to get rid of some of the
thanks that were heartfelt enough if they came unreadily to my
lips, and Howel laughed at both of us. I think that the princess
found her way out of the little constraint first, for she began to
smile merrily.
"There must be a story for me to hear about all this," she said.
"But I was sure that I had seen your eyes before. I was wondering
where it could have been."
"Well," said Howel, "I have sat with the thane for close on an
hour, and now I do not know what colour his eyes are."
"They were all that I could see of him, father," laughed the
princess, and then she put the matter aside. "Now we have been here
long enough, and good Govan shivers on the hilltop. Surely the
thane will ride home with us, and we can talk on the way."
Howel added at once that this was the best plan for me, and what he
was about to ask me himself.
"I know you will want to get home again as soon as may be," he
said. "No doubt Thorgils will take you at once. I will have word
sent to him at Tenby to stay for you."
"Father, you have forgotten," the princess said, somewhat
doubtfully, as I thought.
"Nay, but I have not," answered Howel grimly. "But honest Thorgils
is a white heathen, and those Tenby men are black heathen. He does
not come into our quarrels, and will heed me, if they will not."
I minded that I had heard of trouble between the Tenby Danes and
this prince, and it seemed that he spoke of it again. However, that
I might hear by and by. So I thanked him, and said that I could
wish for nothing better than to be his guest until I could go on my
way hence.
Now the princess went to the cliff top and called Govan, while I
armed myself. The hermit came back, and I bade him farewell, with
many thanks for his kindnesses during the hours I had been with
him; and so I went from the little cell with the blessing of Govan
the Hermit on me, and that was a bright ending to hours which had
been dark enough. Govan the Saint, men call him, now that he has
gone from among them, and rightly do they give him that name, as I
think.
Howel dismounted one of his men, and set me on the horse in his
place, and then we rode to the camp at the landing place by the
track which had led me hither, passing the head of the rift from
which I had escaped, so that I saw its terrors in full daylight.
And they were even more awesome to me than as I hung on the brink
with the depths unknown below me. Then Howel told me how once a
hunter had come suddenly on that gulf with his horse at full
gallop, and had been forced to leap or court death by checking the
steed. He had cleared it in safety, but the terror of what he had
done bided with him, so that he died in no long time; I could well
believe it.
Then the princess told me many things of Govan, and among others
that the poor folk held that when the Danes came and stole the bell
from him he had been hidden from them in the rock wall of the
chapel, which had gaped to take him in, closing on him and setting
him free when danger was past. Certainly there was a cleft in the
rock wall of the chapel wall that had markings as of the ribs of a
man in its sides, and was just the height and width for one to
stand in, but Govan said nought to me about it when he told of the
taking of the bell. Danes also slew all these cattle whose bones I
had passed among.
Then we came in sight of the camp, over which the red dragon banner
of Wales floated, and Howel told me how it was that he had met us
there with his guards.
"Men saw Thorgils' ship from the lookout, and so I came here, for
they said that she could not make Tenby on this tide and must needs
come in here. Nona has been for three months with her mother's folk
in Cornwall--ay, she is half Cornish, and kin to Gerent and Owen. I
was married over there, at Isca, and Owen was at the wedding as my
best man, though he is ten years younger than I. That is how he
came to be the girl's godfather, you see. Now I wanted her back,
for it is lonely at Pembroke without her, and I am apt to wax testy
with folk if she is not near to keep things straight. So I sent
word by Thorgils six weeks ago that she was to come back, and he
was to bring her. I have had the men watching for the ship ever
since. Good it is to see her again, and she has brought good news
also, with yourself. I have a mind to keep you with us awhile, and
let the Norseman take back word of your safety."
But I said that, however pleasant this would be, it seemed plain
that I must get back to Owen with all speed, to warn him of this
trouble that was somewhat more than brewing. It could not be
thought that I would send word and yet never move to his side to
help.
"If I might say what comes into my mind," said the fair princess,
"it seems almost better that none but Owen and yourself know that
the plot is found out, while you guard against it. The traitors
will be less careful if they deem that nought is known. Thorgils is
somewhat talkative, you know."
"That is right," said Howel. "I have a good counsellor here, Thane,
as you see. However, Thorgils will not sail today, for he has just
put in, and I know that he was complaining of some sort of damage
done, as the gale set a bit of a sea into the cove, and he had some
ado to keep clear of the rocks for a time. We will even ride to
Pembroke, and I will send for Thorgils that he may speak with you."
And then he added grimly:
"Moreover, I will send men on the track of Evan, the chapman,
forthwith."
So we called out the guards from the camp, where there were lines
of huts with a greater building in the midst as if it were often
used thus, and so rode across the rolling land northwards till we
came to Pembroke. And there Howel of Dyfed dwelt in state in such a
palace as that of Gerent, for here again the hand of the Saxon had
never come, and the buildings bore the stamp of Imperial Rome.
So once again I was lodged within stone walls, and with a roof
above me that I could touch with my hand, and I need not say how I
fared in all princely wise as the son of Owen. I suppose there
could be no more frank and friendly host than Howel of Dyfed.
Tired I was that night also, and I slept well. But once I woke with
a fear for Owen on me, for I had dreamed that I saw some man
creeping and spying along the wide ramparts of Norton stronghold.
And it seemed that the man had a bow in his hand.