Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Complete by Lytton (an ebook reader TXT) 📖

Godrith, who was pleased with the thegn’s devotion to Harold, and who, knowing the great weight which Vebba (homely as he seemed) carried in his important county, was politically anxious that the Earl should humour so sturdy a friend,—“Thou shalt not sour thy wife’s kiss, man. For look you, as you ride back you will pass by a large old house, with broken columns at the back.”

“I have marked it well,” said the thegn, “when I have gone that way, with a heap of queer stones, on a little hillock, which they say the witches or the Britons heaped together.”

“The same. When Harold leaves London, I trow well towards that house will his road wend; for there lives Edith the swan’s-neck, with her awful grandam the Wicca. If thou art there a little after noon, depend on it thou wilt see Harold riding that way.”

“Thank thee heartily, friend Godrith,” said Vebba, taking his leave, “and forgive my bluntness if I laughed at thy cropped head, for I see thou art as good a Saxon as e’er a franklin of Kent—and so the saints keep thee.”

Vebba then strode briskly over the bridge; and Godrith, animated by the wine he had drunk, turned gaily on his heel to look amongst the crowded tables for some chance friend with whom to while away an hour or so at the games of hazard then in vogue.

Scarce had he turned, when the two listeners, who, having paid their reckoning, had moved under shade of one of the arcades, dropped into a boat which they had summoned to the margin by a noiseless signal, and were rowed over the water. They preserved a silence which seemed thoughtful and gloomy until they reached the opposite shore; then one of them, pushing back his bonnet, showed the sharp and haughty features of Algar.

“Well, friend of Gryffyth,” said he, with a bitter accent, “thou hearest that Earl Harold counts so little on the oaths of thy King, that he intends to fortify the Marches against him; and thou hearest also, that nought save a life, as fragile as the reed which thy feet are trampling, stands between the throne of England and the only Englishman who could ever have humbled my son-in-law to swear oath of service to Edward.”

“Shame upon that hour,” said the other, whose speech, as well as the gold collar round his neck, and the peculiar fashion of his hair, betokened him to be Welch. “Little did I think that the great son of Llewellyn, whom our bards had set above Roderic Mawr, would ever have acknowledged the sovereignty of the Saxon over the hills of Cymry.”

“Tut, Meredydd,” answered Algar, “thou knowest well that no Cymrian ever deems himself dishonoured by breaking faith with the Saxon; and we shall yet see the lions of Gryffyth scaring the sheepfolds of Hereford.”

“So be it,” said Meredydd, fiercely. “And Harold shall give to his Atheling the Saxon land, shorn at least of the Cymrian kingdom.”

“Meredydd,” said Algar, with a seriousness that seemed almost solemn, no Atheling will live to rule these realms! Thou knowest that I was one of the first to hail the news of his coming—I hastened to Dover to meet him. Methought I saw death writ on his countenance, and I bribed the German leach who attends him to answer my questions; the Atheling knows it not, but he bears within him the seeds of a mortal complaint. Thou wottest well what cause I have to hate Earl Harold; and were I the only man to oppose his way to the throne, he should not ascend it but over my corpse. But when Godrith, his creature, spoke, I felt that he spoke the truth; and, the Atheling dead, on no head but Harold’s can fall the crown of Edward.”

“Ha!” said the Cymrian chief, gloomily; “thinkest thou so indeed?”

“I think it not; I know it. And for that reason, Meredydd, we must wait not till he wields against us all the royalty of England. As yet, while Edward lives, there is hope. For the King loves to spend wealth on relics and priests, and is slow when the mancuses are wanted for fighting men. The King too, poor man! is not so ill-pleased at my outbursts as he would fain have it thought; he thinks, by pitting earl against earl, that he himself is the stronger 148. While Edward lives, therefore, Harold’s arm is half crippled; wherefore, Meredydd, ride thou, with good speed, back to King Gryffyth, and tell him all I have told thee. Tell him that our time to strike the blow and renew the war will be amidst the dismay and confusion that the Atheling’s death will occasion. Tell him, that if we can entangle Harold himself in the Welch defiles, it will go hard but what we shall find some arrow or dagger to pierce the heart of the invader. And were Harold but slain—who then would be king in England? The line of Cerdic gone—the House of Godwin lost in Earl Harold, (for Tostig is hated in his own domain, Leofwine is too light, and Gurth is too saintly for such ambition)—who then, I say, can be king in England but Algar, the heir of the great Leofric? And I, as King of England, will set all Cymry free, and restore to the realm of Gryffyth the shires of Hereford and Worcester. Ride fast, O Meredydd, and heed well all I have said.”

“Dost thou promise and swear, that wert thou king of England, Cymry should be free from all service?”

“Free as air, free as under Arthur and Uther: I swear it. And remember well how Harold addressed the Cymrian chiefs, when he accepted Gryffyth’s oaths of service.”

“Remember it—ay,” cried Meredydd, his face lighting up with intense ire and revenge; “the stern Saxon said, ‘Heed well, ye chiefs of Cymry, and thou Gryffyth the King, that if again ye force, by ravage and rapine, by sacrilege and murther, the majesty of England to enter your borders, duty must be done: God grant that your Cymrian lion may leave us in peace—if not, it is mercy to Human life that bids us cut the talons, and draw the fangs.”

“Harold, like all calm and mild men, ever says less than he means,” returned Algar; “and were Harold king, small pretext would he need for cutting the talons and drawing the fangs.”

“It is well,” said Meredydd, with a fierce smile. “I will now go to my men who are lodged yonder; and it is better that thou shouldst not be seen with me.”

“Right; so St. David be with you—and forget not a word of my message to Gryffyth my son-in-law.”

“Not a word,” returned Meredydd, as with a wave of his hand he moved towards an hostelry, to which, as kept by one of their own countrymen, the Welch habitually resorted in the visits to the capital which the various intrigues and dissensions in their unhappy land made frequent.

The chief’s train, which consisted of ten men, all of high birth, were not drinking in the tavern—for sorry customers to mine host were the abstemious Welch. Stretched on the grass under the trees of an orchard that backed the hostelry, and utterly indifferent to all the rejoicings that animated the population of Southwark and London, they were listening to a wild song of the old hero-days from one of their number; and round them grazed the rough shagged ponies which they had used for their journey. Meredydd, approaching, gazed round, and seeing no stranger was