Part 37 (1/2)

”Now we must take you hence,” I said. ”Our men wait, and we can no doubt get them here.”

He smiled, being tired with the joy of seeing us and the speaking, and I went out to Evan. The old woman still sat on the cromlech, and when she saw me her voice rose afresh with more hard words, which I would not notice.

”Evan,” I said, ”how shall we take the prince hence?”

”The litter they brought him on stands behind the hut yonder,” he answered; ”for this man tells me so. Also he says that we are not half a mile from our men, and that we can see one from just above here.”

So I sent him to bring them, telling him how the horses were gone, so that we had no need to go back into the valley. To tell the truth, I was as much relieved in my mind that we need not do so as it was plain that he was. Then when he was gone I went back to Owen, and he asked me if we had seen Morfed. I did not tell him more than that we had done so, but that he was not here, one of his two men having guided us, for the tale we must tell him by and by might be better untold as yet.

”It does not matter,” he said. ”I cannot understand the man. At one time I think that he was at the bottom of all the trouble, and at another that he rescued me from the men who fell on the house. I have seen little of him here until yesterday and today. There is a man whom he calls 'the Bard,' who has tended me well enough with the old dame, and another whom he names 'the Ovate,' whom I have seen now and then--a younger man. I have set eyes on none but these four since the men of the burning left me to them in the hills.”

We asked him how all that went, and he told us what he could remember. He had waked from some sort of a swoon while he was being carried, in the midst of many men, and again had come to himself when his litter had been set down. At that time there was seemingly a quarrel between Morfed and his two followers and these men, and it ended by the many departing and leaving him to the priest. That was, as I knew, when the hillmen would not come into the lost valley.

”They set my sword beside me,” he said. ”Presently in the dark I saw the gleam of a pool, and I made s.h.i.+ft to throw it into the water, so that no outlaw or Morgan's man should boast that he wore it. Ina gave it me. One of the men saw me throw it, and was for staying, but the other said he had heard the splash and that it was gone. Morfed was not near at the time, having gone on. I heard him singing somewhere beyond the water.”

”I have found it, father,” I said. ”It was on the edge of the pool, in long gra.s.s, and it helped us somewhat, for we knew you were near. Now say if it is well to move you yet. We can bide here with the men if not.”

He laughed a little.

”I think so, but that is a question for the leech. Ask the dame.

Maybe she will answer if you speak her fair.”

Howel went to do that, saying that maybe she would listen to a Briton, for most of her wrath was concerning my Saxon arms. So presently I heard her shrill voice growing calmer as Howel coaxed her, and then there was a sound as if she climbed from her perch, and Howel came back to us.

”We may take you, she says. Hither come the men in all haste also, and we may get away from this place at once. These hills are uncanny on Midsummer Eve, and I am glad that we have long daylight before us.”

Then said Owen:

”Oswald, I have not withal, but I would fain reward the bard and the old woman for their care of me. I think that even at Glas...o...b..ry there are none who would have healed these hurts of mine more easily than she.”

I had my own thoughts about the bard, but I said that I would see to this, and went to him. The men were close at hand, and I saw that they led our horses with them.

”Bard,” I said, ”Owen the prince speaks well of you. Is it true that you would have slain him had you not been stayed on your way?”

”I do not know, Lord,” he answered. ”When I was with Morfed, needs must I do his bidding, even against my will. Yet, away from him, I think that I should not have harmed the prince. I am a Christian man, for all that you have seen.”

”There was somewhat strangely heathenish in what I did see,” I said. ”But I suppose that is all done with?”

”I might go across the sea to the British lands in the north or in the south and learn to attain to druids.h.i.+p,” he said. ”But I will not. What I know shall die with me. He who was the next to me above, even Morfed, is gone, and he who was next below is gone also. Druid and Ovate both. I am the only one of the old line left, and I will be the last. Call me Bard no longer, I pray you.”

”Well,” I said, for there was that in the face of the man which told me that he was in earnest, ”I will believe you, and the more that Owen trusts you.”

I let loose his hands then, and he stretched his cramped arms and thanked me. I minded well what that feeling was like.

”What would Morfed have done with the prince?” I asked.

”I do not know. I have heard him plan many things. I think that if he had won him to his thoughts concerning the men of Canterbury he would have taken him home. If not, I only know this, that he would never have been seen in this land again. There was a thought of carrying him even across the sea to the Britons in the south--in Gaul. But of all things Morfed hoped that he would die here.”

So I supposed, but I said no more, for Evan and the men reined up close to us. There was joy enough among them all as Owen was slowly and carefully laid on the rough litter. And we left those two staring after us, silent. But I suppose that the terror of that strange place will still lie on all the countryside, and I hold that since the day when the wizards of old time reared the menhir on that which it covered, with cruel rites and terrible words that have bided in the minds of men as a terror will bide, no man but such as Morfed has dared to pry into that valley lest the ancient curse should fall on them--the curse of the Druid who would hide his secrets. It may be, therefore, that it will not be known by the folk that the menhir has fallen, even yet, for we who did know it told them nought thereof.