but the strange man had refused, saying that his own legs he
could trust, but not those of a four-footed beast.

It was seven in the bright May morning when Dane and Saxon met on
Combwich Hill. It was midday when I met Wulfhere at the nunnery, and now
it was three hours and more past. But I thought there was yet light
enough left for us to find our way across Sedgemoor, and lodge that
night in safety in the village near the collier's hut; and so, too,
thought Wulfhere when I, thinking that perhaps Alswythe's grief might
find its own solace in tears when I was not by her, rode on beside him
for a while.

"Once set me on Polden hills, master," said Wulfhere, "I can do well
enough, knowing that country from my youth. But this is a good chance
that has sent you your friend the collier."

So he spoke, and then I fell to wondering, if it was all chance, as we
say, that led my feet in that night of wandering to Dudda's hut, that
now I might find help in sorer need than that. For few there are who
could serve as guide over that waste of fen and swamp, and but for him
we must needs have kept the main roads, far longer in their way to
Glastonbury, as skirting Sedgemoor, and now to be choked with flying
people.

Presently Wulfhere asked me if in that village we might find one good
house where to lodge the Lady Alswythe. And I told him that there I had
not been, but at least knew of one substantial franklin, for my
playfellow, Turkil, had been the son of such an one, as I was told. The
collier, who ran, holding my stirrup leather, tireless on his lean limbs
as a deerhound, heard this, and told me that the man's house was good
and strong--not like those in Bridgwater--but a great house for
these parts. So I was satisfied enough.

Then this man Dudda, finding I listened to him in that matter, began to
talk, asking me questions of the fighting, and presently "if I had seen
the saint?"

I asked him what he meant; and as I did so I heard Wulfhere chuckle to
himself. Then he told me a wild story that was going round the town. How
that, when all seemed lost, there came suddenly a wondrous vision,
rising up before the men, of a saint clad in armour and riding a white
horse, having his face covered lest men should be blinded by the light
thereof, who, standing with drawn sword on Cannington Hill, so bade the
men take courage that they turned and beat the Danes back. Whereupon he
vanished, though the white horse yet remained for a lit