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I remember how his wife Elfgiva once said of him that it was well his crown was no more than a ring of gold, for then, when his mood changed, he could use it for such a gold hoop as kings' children are wont to play with." "Said Elfgiva of Northampton that?" Eric asked in surprise. "Never would I have believed her so wise in words.
Does not that look like a sign that my thought is good?" Elfgiva threw aside the candle to come close and lay her hands upon the girl's breast. "Good for what?" she demanded. "Do you think it likely that I might fall in with the King somewhere in the City?" This was going a bit faster than Randalin had planned, and her breath came quickly, but she took the risk and admitted it.
Catching this last phrase, as her Valkyria came abreast of her, Elfgiva spoke pettishly: "You see fit to sing a different tune from what you did when you tried to hinder me from this undertaking. I should have brighter hopes if I had not given ear to your advice to send a messenger ahead. If I could have come upon him before he had time to work himself into a hostile temper "
It would make you feel better if you would listen to them." "Then he he does not blame me for this?" Elfgiva quavered at last. "He does not blame you," the Marshal hastened to reassure her. "And in token thereof he sends you your heart's desire." Plainly, the elves had endowed their "gift" with a wit to match her soul.
As she obeyed, Randalin laughed a little, for the ring was a man's ring, a massive spiral whose two ends were finished with serpents' heads, and her thickest finger was but a loose fit in its girth. But Elfgiva, when she had seen it on, closed her eyes with an air of satisfaction. "To keep from losing it, will keep it in your mind," she said. "Now leave me. Candida, more softly!
"You know with certainty that she has never seen him since?" he demanded, "that Danes had naught to do with the last token Elfgiva sent through the scullion? You can swear to it?" "Certainly, if they speak the truth, I know it," she answered wonderingly. "How should Danes why, Sebert, what ails you?"
Elfgiva laughed beautifully then, and the Danish girl took a fresh grip upon her patience. Certainly the jewelled bugs, the golden snakes, the strands of amber and jet and pearl, seemed to act as tonics upon the Northampton lady. If she had not traded away, at the first two stalls, every ornament in her possession, she would have investigated each booth in the square.
Only Elfgiva the queen, whom her own people call Emma, was well content to be in her own land again for a while, though one might easily see that she sorely grieved for the loss of her state as the queen of England.
It was a suit much richer than the old one, since silver embroidery banded the blue, and precious furs lined the cloak; but that fact was evidently of little comfort to her, as her eyes were full of angry tears, and she deigned the King no answer whatever. "I am obliged to pay dearly for your amusement, lady," she said bitterly. Elfgiva chimed her bell-like laughter.
Over stubble fields and leaf-carpeted lanes, with half frightened smiles upon their parted lips, Elfgiva and her fair ones kept up bravely; then across a stream into a thicket, over hollows and fallen logs, under low-hanging boughs, through brush and brier and bramble, leaping, dodging, tearing, crashing.
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