.

'To this very valley. We came in by the Lower Ford under the King's
Hill yonder'--he pointed eastward where the valley widens.

'And was that Saxon Hugh the novice?' Dan asked.

'Yes, and more than that. He had been for three years at the monastery
at Bec by Rouen, where'--Sir Richard chuckled--'the Abbot Herluin would
not suffer me to remain.'

'Why wouldn't he?' said Dan.

'Because I rode my horse into the refectory, when the scholars were at
meat, to show the Saxon boys we Normans were not afraid of an Abbot.
It was that very Saxon Hugh tempted me to do it, and we had not met
since that day. I thought I knew his voice even inside my helmet, and,
for all that our Lords fought, we each rejoiced we had not slain the
other. He walked by my side, and he told me how a heathen God, as he
believed, had given him his sword, but he said he had never heard it
sing before. I remember I warned him to beware of sorcery and quick
enchantments.' Sir Richard smiled to himself. 'I was very young--very
young! 'When we came to his house here we had almost forgotten that we
had been at blows. It was near midnight, and the Great Hall was full
of men and women waiting news. There I first saw his sister, the Lady
Aelueva, of whom he had spoken to us in France. She cried out fiercely
at me, and would have had me hanged in that hour, but her brother said
that I had spared his life--he said not how he saved mine from the
Saxons--and that our Duke had won the day; and even while they wrangled
over my poor body, of a sudden he fell down in a swoon from his wounds.

"'This is thy fault," said the Lady Aelueva to me, and she kneeled
above him and called for wine and cloths.

"'If I had known," I answered, "he should have ridden and I walked.
But he set me on my horse; he made no complaint; he walked beside me
and spoke merrily throughout. I pray I have done him no harm."

"'Thou hast need to pray," she said, catching up her underlip. "If he
dies, thou shalt hang."

'They bore off Hugh to his chamber; but three tall men of the house
bound me and set me under the beam of the Great Hall with a rope round
my neck. The end of the rope they flung over the beam, and they sat
them down by the fire to wait word whether Hugh lived or died. They
cracked nuts with their knife-hilts the while.'

'And how did you feel?' said Dan.

'Very weary; but I did heartily pray for my schoolmate Hugh his health.
About noon I heard horses in th