Part 32 (1/2)
Then I looked round for my shepherd, but he had fled.
”Come to the house with me,” I said. ”I think that none will know you, and if they do so I will answer for you.”
”No, Thane; after tomorrow, seeing that even Howel sets such store on finding the valley, as men tell me, I shall be safe even from him. I think that you are the only one who will trust me yet.”
There I knew that he was most likely right. Had I not been certain that he could have kept me from knowing him even yet, I think that I might have been doubtful of him myself.
”As you will,” I answered. ”We can meet tomorrow. Now give me that token by which I am to know that you have not harmed Owen.”
”It is right that you should not yet trust me,” Evan said, as if he read my thoughts, ”for I do not deserve it. Here is one token: 'It is not good to sleep in the moonlight.' And I will give you yet another, if I may, for, indeed, I would have you know that the words I spoke yonder were true when I said that you should be glad that you freed me, and that I have tried to serve you. That may be known by the token of the blackthorn spine and the dog whip.”
I reined up my horse in wonderment and stared at him, and he came close to my side, so that I could see him plainly. And, lo! his shoulders grew rounded, and his eyes crossed terribly, and they bided so, and he mumbled the words he had said when the whip of the huntsman fell on him.
Then he straightened himself again and looked timidly at me. He was not like the man who had bound me so cruelly in Holford combe on the Quantocks.
”Evan,” I cried, ”what you did for me at the ealdorman's gate is enough to win any pardon you may need.”
”It is wonderful that, after all, pardon should come from you, Thane. Do you mind how I said to you that I hoped to win it otherwise through you when we took you on the Quantocks? It is good to feel as a free man once more.”
”Free, and maybe honoured yet, Evan,” I said; for I knew that he had risked his life for me and Owen. ”Presently you shall come with me to Wess.e.x, where none know you, and there shall be a fresh life for you. It is in my mind that what you brought on me was as a last hope.”
”Ay, that is true, Thane.”
And then I asked him to tell me all he knew of Owen, and of what had happened here, and how it came about that he knew aught. And as he told me it was plain that this was a true tale, for one could feel it so.
He had followed Owen, keeping himself hidden, after I went to Winchester, for there he knew that I was safe, and yet he would serve me if he could. So from the hillside where he lay he had seen the burning and the fight; and after Owen fell he followed them who bore him away, till he lost them in a grey mist that rolled from the hills and hid them in the darkness. Nor had he been able to find trace of them again, though he had hunted far and wide.
And so he waited for my coming, being sure that I would not be long. But he knew that they had gone toward what he called the lost valley, if it was not likely that they would dare so much as look into it.
”But,” he said, ”there was a priest with them, seeming to lead them. Maybe he would dare.”
Into my mind at once came the certainty that this must be Morfed, but Evan knew nought of him. He had no more to tell me of this.
CHAPTER XIII. HOW OSWALD AND HOWEL DARED THE SECRET OF THE MENHIR, AND MET A WIZARD.
So we two rode on together over the wild hills, and talked of what chance there might be of finding Owen on the morrow. He could not tell me if his wounds were deep, for he was far off and helpless, but he told me how he had fought, and that was even as I had known he would.
Now the soft June darkness had fallen, and we were not a mile from the first houses of the village. Soon, if they were alert, we should meet the first outpost of our men who guarded us, and mayhap it were better that Evan came no farther tonight. Yet I would know somewhat of himself and the way in which he had helped me thus. So I stayed my horse and dismounted for a few minutes.
”Tell me, Evan,” I said, ”how came you into trouble at the first?”
”It is easy, Thane,” he answered. ”I was Evan the chapman, and well known near and far in Cornwall and Dyvnaint as an honest man, even as I have seemed yet beyond the water. Two years ago I slew the steward of this Tregoz in the open market place of Isca, and there was indeed little blame to me, for I did but protect my goods which he would have taken by force, and smote too hard. Little order was there in that market if the king was not there, and Morgan and his friends were in the town. Men have taken heart again since the coming back of Owen, for it was bad enough, as you may suppose by what happened to me. So I fled, and then Tregoz had me outlawed, with a price on my head, so that, being well known, I had to take to Exmoor and herd with others in the same case. I knew that no weregild, as the Saxon calls it, would be enough to save me from the Cornishman.
”There I was the one who could sell the stolen goods across the water, being held in good repute there, and I traded with the Norse strangers who ferried me across. So it was that when Owen came I was in Watchet, and there Tregoz saw me and laid hands on me. Then he needed men to carry out that which he would do, and he had me forth and spoke to me, saying that if I would manage the Quantock outlaws for him he would forgive me and have me inlawed again. I was to have been hanged that day, Thane, and so you will see that I had no choice. Owen's coming saved me then.”
Evan was not the first man whom I had known to be driven into evil ways by misfortune and powerful enemies. I had little blame for him. A man will do much to save his neck from the rope. But this did not tell me how he knew the plans of Tregoz after I set him free in Dyfed.
”Then you came back to the Cornishman after I freed you?” I asked.
”That I did not, Thane, for the best of reasons. He would have hanged me at once if he were in power, and I had not meant to let him set eyes on me again in any case, for he was treacherous. I came back round the head waters of the Severn, through Wess.e.x, where I was only a Weala, though, indeed, that is almost the same as an outlaw there; and there, by reason of Gerent's seeking for me, I changed my looks and watched for Tregoz, for I found that he was yet about the place in hiding. Thralls know and tell these things to men of their own sort, though they seem to know nothing if you ask them, Thane.”