know you, and it will be as if there had been no change, and
that will mean that we shall have no grumbling in the palace, and
the right men will be sent to do what they are best fitted for--and
all that, so that there will be quiet about the court as ever. It
is a matter off my mind, let me tell you, and no thanks are
needed."

So he laughed and let me kiss his hand, patting me on the shoulder
as I rose, and then bade me sit down again. He had yet more to say.

"With Erpwald who is dead, men would hold that you had a blood
feud. That is done with; but his son yet lives. I do not think it
is your way, or Owen's, to hold that a feud must be carried on in
the old heathen way of our forefathers."

"Most truly not," I said. "What ill has a son of Erpwald done to me
or mine?"

"None! Nay, rather has he done well, for I know that he has
honoured the grave of your father, and even now is ready to do what
he can to make amends for the old wrong. He brought me this."

He took up the parchment that he had shewn me before. It was a
grant of the manors of Eastdean to Erpwald, gained by those means
of utmost craft whereby the king thought that indeed the last of
our line had perished by other hands than those of the heathen
thane.

"Honest and straightforward and Christian-like is this young
Erpwald," the king said. "Well brought up by his Christian mother,
if not very ready or brilliant in his ways. Now he has learned how
his father came into the lands, and though he might well have held
them after his uncle on this grant, he has come hither to set the
matter in my hands. 'It is not fair,' quoth he, 'that I should hold
them if one is left of the line of Ella. I should not sleep easily
in my bed. Nevertheless, I will buy them if so be that one is left
to sell them to me.' So he sighed, for the place is his home."

"All these years it has been no trouble to me that Erpwald's
brother has held the place, my King. It will be no trouble to think
that a better Erpwald holds them yet."

"I do not think that he will be happy unless he deems that he has
paid some price--some weregild {ii}, as one may say; for slow
minds as his hang closely to their thoughts when they are formed.
See, Oswald, I have thought of all this, and the young man has been
here for a fortnight. I brought him here from Winchester, where he
joined me. Let me tell you what I think."

"The matter is in your hands altogether, my King."

"As you have set it th