A King's Comrade Part 34

But yet I have to tell somewhat strange of this journey, and how it came about I do not rightly know. Nor will I answer for the truth of it all, for part of that I must set down I did not see for myself; only the priests told me, and they heard it from the men who did see.

This cart was old and crazy. I think that Gymbert must have taken it from some deserted farm, whence it would not be missed. It was open behind, and its wheels were bad. Still it served us; and glad enough we were of it, for the road was rough, and heavy with the rain of the day. It pained me to see the thing jolting and lurching as it went, knowing how little it befitted that which it was honoured in bearing.

Presently out of the roadside rose up a man, and joined us.

"Good sirs," he said, "I am a blind man, and would fain be led to Fernlea. May I go with you so far as the road you take lies in that direction?"

"Truly, my son," said the eldest priest. "But you are afoot late."

"'Tis a priest speaks to me, as I hear," said the man, doffing his cap in the direction of the voice and laughing gently. "Is it so late, father? Well, I have thought so, for there seem to be few men about. Yet I slept alone in a shed last night, and know not for how long. I think I have also slept some of today, for I am out of count of the hours. There is neither dark nor light for me."

He fell back and walked after the cart, saying no more. Now and then I heard his stick tapping the stones of the way, and once one of our men helped him in a rough place, and he thanked him.

Now we came to a terribly bad place in the road, and there the cart seemed like to break down; and it was the worse for us that a cloud came over the moon at the time, and it was very dark. Whereby the blind man was of much help in the care for the cart, until the moon shone out again suddenly, when he was left behind us for a few minutes. Then we heard him calling.

"Two of you help the poor soul," said the reeve, "else he will hardly get across that slough. He has fallen, I think."

He named two of his own men, and they went back. After a while the blind man's voice came again, and he seemed to be shouting joyfully. I thought it was by reason of the help that came to him.

"Thane," said the eldest priest to me just at this time, "I pray you ride on and tell the archbishop that you have indeed found what we sought. It is but right that all should be ready against the time we get back. We are not more than a mile away from the gates, and you will have time. This is slow travelling, perforce."

Erling and I rode on with the reeve, therefore, and I thought no more of the blind man, as one may suppose, until I heard what had happened.

When the two men went back to his help, he sat again by the side of the road, hiding his face in his hands on his knees. And he was trembling.

"Friends," he said, "now I know why you go so sadly, welladay! For evil men have slain some one young and well favoured, as I learned even now, when I helped you yonder. Tell me what has befallen, I pray you, for I am afeard."

"Why," said one of the men, "we are honest folk, as our being with the good fathers may be surety. The trouble is ours to bear."

But the blind man still kept his eyes hidden, and when the other man bade him rise and come on with them he did not move.

"I know not what ails me," he said. "Even as I set my hand on him you bear yonder, there came as it were a great flash of light across my eyes, and needs must I fall away and hide them. I fear that, not you, friends. I pray you, tell me what has been wrought."

"His foes have slain a bridegroom, most cruelly," one of the men answered after a pause. "We do but bear him to Fernlea."

"What bridegroom?" he asked, in a hushed voice.

And then the pity of the thing came to him, and he wept silently.

Presently he raised his head, das.h.i.+ng away the tears as he did so.

"It is a many years since these eyes of mine have wept," he said.

"It seems to me that to weep for the woes of another is a wondrous thing."

His eyes of a sudden opened widely in the moonlight, and he cried out and clutched at the man next him.

"Brothers! brothers!" he said; "what is this?"

And again he set his hand to his eyes as if shading them, as does a man at noontide.

"What ails you?" one of the men asked, wondering.

"I have no ailment--none. I see once more!" he cried. "Look you, yonder is the blessed moon, and there lies a broken tree; and see, there are fires on the hills of the Welshmen!"

Then with both hands wide before him he said:

"Now I see that I have set my hands on one who can be naught but a saint most holy, for therefrom I have my sight again. Who is this that has been slain?"

The men answered him, telling him. The blind man had heard, of course, of the poor young king, and had, indeed, been brought hither from wherever he lived that he might share in the largess of the wedding day.

Now the men would go their way with him again, wondering, but yet half doubting the truth of what the man said.

"It is in my mind that you have not been so blind as you would have us think," said one, growling.

The man pointed at the cart as it went.

"Would I lie in that presence?" he said.

And with that he broke into the song I had heard. Some old chant of victory it was, which he made to fit his case, being somewhat of a gleeman, as so many of these wanderers are. And there the men left him in the road, singing and careless of aught save his recovered sight, and hastened after the party.

Yet it was not until the next day that they told the tale, and whether the once blind man was ever found again I cannot tell; but I have set this down as I knew of it, because it was the first of many healings wrought by the saint we loved. I ken well that the tale is told nowadays in a more awesome way; but let that pa.s.s.

Tales of wonder grow ever more strange as the years go on.

Men call Ethelbert a martyr now, I suppose because he was slain.

That is not quite what we mean by a martyr, for that is one who gives up his life rather than deny his Lord. Yet Ethelbert was indeed a witness to the faith all his life, and so the name may stand.

So presently they brought back the body to Fernlea, and its resting was ready in the little church which had come into the strange dream by the riverside. And I knew, as I watched by it all the rest of that night till the hour of prime, that this was what the vision foreboded.

CHAPTER XVI. HOW WILFRID SPOKE ONCE MORE WITH OFFA.

Now that I had Hilda safe with the archbishop, it mattered nothing to me if all the world knew that I was yet here. So when Ealdwulf, the archbishop himself, asked me to ride with him to Sutton Palace and tell Offa of the finding, I said that I was most willing. I should see Selred, and maybe bring him away with me, and at least could tell him that all was well with Hilda.

I will say now that she was none the worse for the wetting and the rest of last night's doings, but that I saw her come fresh and bright to the breakfast in the little hall of the reeve's house.

There she would bide till she could go with the archbishop homewards in some way, most likely from nunnery to nunnery across the land, as ladies will often travel, with parties of the holy women--that is, if Sighard was not to be found. In my own mind I thought that he would not be far off, most likely with Witred, the Mercian thane who had arranged the flight.

Presently, therefore, we rode away from Fernlea toward Sutton, there being but one priest with the archbishop, and six of the townsmen, besides Erling and myself. It was no state visit, but the going of one who would speak with an erring friend in private.

Sorely downcast was the good man, for he loved Offa well, and this terrible wrong lay heavily on his heart.

Halfway or so to Sutton we pa.s.sed the place where trees were thick, and I saw a man lurking among them as if he was watching the road.

Wherefore I watched him, and presently saw that he was coming to us, as if half afraid. Somehow the walk and figure of this man seemed known to me, though his face was strange, and I thought that he made for myself. Soon I knew that this was indeed the case; for finding that there were none whom he need fear in the party, the man came boldly from the trees, and, cap in hand, stood by the wayside waiting me.

"Well, friend, what is it?" I asked, as he walked alongside my horse.

He answered in Welsh, and then I knew that he was the guide we had been given last night.

"Jefan ap Huwal the prince sends greeting to the thane on the pied horse, and bids him and the lady come to him if there is need for help. He has heard that the thane serves the Frankish king who hates Saxons beyond the seas, and thinks that mayhap he has foes here in Mercia."