Part 3 (1/2)

”Fighting for a woman's love who should have fallen in the Holy War? Alas! poor son; alas! poor son! Alas! that we must part again forever!” and his voice, too, pa.s.sed away.

Lo! a Glory advanced through the blackness, and the angels at head and foot stood up and saluted with their flaming spears.

”How died this child of G.o.d?” asked a voice, speaking out of the Glory, a low and awful voice.

”He died by the sword,” answered the angel.

”By the sword of the children of the enemy, fighting in the war of Heaven?”

Then the angels were silent.

”What has Heaven to do with him, if he fought not for Heaven?”

asked the voice again.

”Let him be spared,” pleaded the guardians, ”who was young and brave, and knew not. Send him back to earth, there to retrieve his sins and be our charge once more.”

”So be it,” said the voice. ”Knight, live on, but live as a knight of Heaven if thou wouldst win Heaven.”

”Must he then put the woman from him?” asked the angels.

”It was not said,” answered the voice speaking from the Glory.

And all that wild vision vanished.

Then a s.p.a.ce of oblivion, and G.o.dwin awoke to hear other voices around him, voices human, well-beloved, remembered; and to see a face bending over him--a face most human, most well-beloved, most remembered--that of his cousin Rosamund. He babbled some questions, but they brought him food, and told him to sleep, so he slept. Thus it went on, waking and sleep, sleep and waking, till at length one morning he woke up truly in the little room that opened out of the solar or sitting place of the Hall of Steeple, where he and Wulf had slept since their uncle took them to his home as infants. More, on the trestle bed opposite to him, his leg and arm bandaged, and a crutch by his side, sat Wulf himself, somewhat paler and thinner than of yore, but the same jovial, careless, yet at times fierce-faced Wulf.

”Do I still dream, my brother, or is it you indeed?”

A happy smile spread upon the face of Wulf, for now he knew that G.o.dwin was himself again.

”Me sure enough,” he answered. ”Dream-folk don't have lame legs; they are the gifts of swords and men.”

”And Rosamund? What of Rosamund? Did the grey horse swim the creek, and how came we here? Tell me quick--I faint for news!”

”She shall tell you herself.” And hobbling to the curtained door, he called, ”Rosamund, my--nay, our--cousin Rosamund, G.o.dwin is himself again. Hear you, G.o.dwin is himself again, and would speak with you!”

There was a swift rustle of robes and a sound of quick feet among the rushes that strewed the floor, and then--Rosamund herself, lovely as ever, but all her stateliness forgot in joy. She saw him, the gaunt G.o.dwin sitting up upon the pallet, his grey eyes s.h.i.+ning in the white and sunken face. For G.o.dwin's eyes were grey, while Wulf's were blue, the only difference between them which a stranger would note, although in truth Wulf's lips were fuller than G.o.dwin's, and his chin more marked; also he was a larger man. She saw him, and with a little cry of delight ran and cast her arms about him, and kissed him on the brow.

”Be careful,” said Wulf roughly, turning his head aside, ”or, Rosamund, you will loose the bandages, and bring his trouble back again; he has had enough of blood-letting.”

”Then I will kiss him on the hand--the hand that saved me,” she said, and did so. More, she pressed that poor, pale hand against her heart.

”Mine had something to do with that business also but I don't remember that you kissed it, Rosamund. Well, I will kiss him too, and oh! G.o.d be praised, and the holy Virgin, and the holy Peter, and the holy Chad, and all the other holy dead folk whose names I can't recall, who between them, with the help of Rosamund here, and the prayers of the Prior John and brethren at Stangate, and of Matthew, the village priest, have given you back to us, my brother, my most beloved brother.” And he hopped to the bedside, and throwing his long, sinewy arms about G.o.dwin embraced him again and again.

”Be careful,” said Rosamund drily, ”or, Wulf, you will disturb the bandages, and he has had enough of blood-letting.”

Then before he could answer, which he seemed minded to do, there came the sound of a slow step, and swinging the curtain aside, a tall and n.o.ble-looking knight entered the little place. The man was old, but looked older than he was, for sorrow and sickness had wasted him. His snow-white hair hung upon his shoulders, his face was pale, and his features were pinched but finely-chiselled, and notwithstanding the difference of their years, wonderfully like to those of the daughter Rosamund. For this was her father, the famous lord, Sir Andrew D'Arcy.

Rosamund turned and bent the knee to him with a strange and Eastern grace, while Wulf bowed his head, and G.o.dwin, since his neck was too stiff to stir, held up his hand in greeting. The old man looked at him, and there was pride in his eye.

”So you will live after all, my nephew,” he said, ”and for that I thank the giver of life and death, since by G.o.d, you are a gallant man--a worthy child of the bloods of the Norman D'Arcy and of Uluin the Saxon. Yes, one of the best of them.”

”Speak not so, my uncle,” said G.o.dwin; ”or at least, here is a worthier,”--and he patted the hand of Wulf with his lean fingers. ”It was Wulf who bore me through. Oh, I remember as much as that--how he lifted me onto the black horse and bade me to cling fast to mane and pommel. Ay, and I remember the charge, and his cry of 'Contre D'Arcy, contre Mort!' and the flas.h.i.+ng of swords about us, and after that--nothing.”