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So as we rode with no other near us, he said: "What of Hertha, my cousin?" "I know not," I answered. "I have heard nought, nor shall I now till I go back to Bures." "Shall you hold to your betrothal?" "Aye; the ladies think that it is my part to do so." "So you asked them? Is that why fair Sexberga is so dull and restless?"
For they were written by Elfric the abbot, my friend, thus: Written by the hand of Elfric, Abbot of St. Peter's Minster at Medehamstede. I, Elfric, bid you, my son Redwald, be of cheer, for in the end all shall be for the best. Bide in your home of Bures if Cnut wills, as I think shall be, and see to the good of your own people as would your father who has gone. There is an end of war for England.
Then a brightness came over the king's face, and he answered me slowly and plainly, and with great joy, as it were. "Presently I shall meet with Eadmund, your martyred king, and to him I will say that his thane of Bures is worthy." "Forget me not also, my father, when you come to that place," Eadward said. "I will not forget.
Many were the tales I had heard of the coming of Ingvar's host in the days of Eadmund our martyred king, who was crowned here at Bures in our own church, and those tales were terrible. Now the like was on us, and I saw that what I had heard was not the half. The old steward rose up now, shaking his head in sorrow. I think he was too old for fear.
I sat plaiting a leash for my hounds on the settle before the fire in our great hall at Bures, and I remember how the strands of leather thong fell in my hand; I remember how my mother's spinning wheel stopped short with a snapping of broken threads; how the thrall who was feeding the fire stayed with the log in his hands; how the sleepy men at the lower end of the hall sprang up with heavy words checked on their lips before the lady's presence; how the maidens screamed aye, and how the draught swayed the wall hangings, and sent a long train of sparks flying from a half-dead torch, as the great door was thrown open and a man flung himself into our midst, mud splashed and white faced, with hands that quivered towards us as he cried hoarsely: "In haste, mistress you must fly the Danes " and fell like a log at my mother's feet where she sat on the dais, neither moving nor speaking more.
Paul was taken from us by the Comte de Bures and Monsieur de Reu, for he, being so astonished with fear as to throw himself, colours and all, out of a porthole, was immediately, cut to pieces by the enemy; and in the same siege, it was a very memorable fear that so seized, contracted, and froze up the heart of a gentleman, that he sank down, stone-dead, in the breach, without any manner of wound or hurt at all.
"My son, had you not felt this matter very deeply, I know you would not have troubled yourself even to wrath about it. Truly I was glad to hear you speak so. There is nought to forgive." So he said, and maybe he was right. I rode back presently to Bures with my heart full of joy, and a wondrous content.
For so it was, as one might see written in the faces of the London burghers, who alone of all England had baffled him again and again, and now could not do enough honour to him. He had won even their love. When I would go back to Bures, Emma the queen sent for me, hearing that I would speak with her ere I went, and she received me most kindly, coming down from her high place to greet me.
Even we Angles never forgot that the race of Ecgberht was Saxon and not of our own kin altogether. The Dane was as near to us as the Wessex king, save by old comradeship, and the ties that had come with years. So all that Edred and I could do was to bid the steward take his orders from Gunnhild, and so ride back to Bures along the riverside track.
But I told him of Dame Gunnhild's words, and begged him to seek her and speak with her, for she might hide him also for a while if he would not leave the place altogether. So we left our home, and that was the last time I set eyes on our hall at Bures.
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