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I beg your pardon, you wouldn't mind me bursting in if you knew how very important the treasure is to the fortunes of our house." The lawyer laughed. "I am deeply interested in buried treasure. It would be a great treat to me if Lord Arden would allow me to assist in the search for it." "There's no search now," said Elfrida, "because it's found. We've been searching for ages.
The horses pricked up their ears at the well-known sound, and stood with lifted heads watching as eagerly as we. Then there came a little cry from Elfrida as she bade her horse stand, and I heard it trampling sharply, as if restive, behind us. I turned in my saddle to see what was amiss, and what I saw made my blood run cold, and the sweat broke out on my forehead in a moment.
"Sure's I'm alive you be," the mole answered; "yer uncle'll tell it you with all de lawyer's reasons to-morrow morning as sure's sure. Come along, den. Dere ain't no time to lose." So Dickie went down on his hands and knees, and crept down the mole tunnel of soft, sweet-smelling earth, and then along, and then up and there they were in the courtyard. There, too, were Edred and Elfrida.
I think that this feast was the first Elfrida and her father had been present at since then, and at least, that was the reason I heard given for her presence on the high place. Now I must say where my place was in the hall, for it may make more plain what happened hereafter.
The people favored Edward, as the rightful heir, and the nobility and clergy, who feared the imperious temper of Elfrida, determined to thwart her schemes. To put an end to the matter, Dunstan the monk, the all-powerful king-maker of that epoch, had the young prince anointed and crowned. The whole kingdom supported his act, and the hopes of Elfrida were seemingly at an end.
At least, so said Erpwald, who looked over, riding to the very edge. I had no wish to do so, having been there before, and not altogether liking it. Then he wanted Elfrida to look over also, and that frightened her, and so we rode back and forth a little, for the wind was keen on the hill, listening for sound of horn or hound in the cover.
The time had arrived when Elfrida was deprived of this her one relief and consolation her rides on the Downs and the exercise of her religion at the temple of the Great Stones when in the second winter of her residence at Amesbury there fell a greater darkness than that of winter on England, when the pirate kings of the north began once more to frequent our shores, and the daily dreadful tale of battles and massacres and burning of villages and monasteries was heard throughout the kingdom.
"We can't do anything," said Edred again; "don't snivel like that, for goodness' sake, Elfrida. This is a man's job. Dry up. I can't think, with you blubbing like that." "I'm not," said Elfrida untruly, and sniffed with some intensity. "If you could make up some poetry now," Edred went on, "would that be any good?" "Not without the dresses," she sniffed.
And then, after we had spoken long together, Thorgils was sent for, and he told the tale of the end of Morgan plainly and in few words, yet in such skilful wise that as he spoke I could seem to see once more our hall and myself and Elfrida at the dais, even as though I were an onlooker. "You are a skilful tale teller," the king said when he ended.
"Oh!" he gasped, and Dickie, looking up, whispered, "It's all up run. Never mind me. I shall get away all right." "No," said Edred, and then with a joyous leap of the heart perceived that the dark figure was Elfrida in her father's ulster. "Elfrida!" said both boys at once. "Well, you didn't think I was going to be out of it," she said. "I've been behind you all the way, Edred.
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