him all, calling him out from the feast.

"Let us mount and rescue the king," I said.

"Then will they kill him--better not. They will but hold him to
ransom," the thane said.

I knew his first word was right, and now I left that and urged him
to hasten the flight of all the party, bidding him take the road
towards the south, ever away from the Danes.

"What will you do?" he asked, for I spoke not of coming with him.

"This," I answered. "I will pledge Ingild's word, as I know I may,
for any ransom, going after the Danes and finding Guthrum, who will
listen to me."

He thought that well, and then I asked where Humbert the Bishop
was. He had gone back to South Elmham at once, and would be far on
his road by this time, the thane said.

Then I went out and took a fresh horse from the stables and rode
away into the great road. And when I came there, I saw with others
the man who told me how the king's hiding place was found.

"How long have the Danes been gone?" I asked.

"Master," he answered, "they have gone back over the bridge, some
of them riding forward towards Hoxne."

At that I knew that some plan of Ingvar's was that his men after
victory should cross the river at Thetford, and so perhaps strike
at Framlingham where the king's household was. But all along the
march of the Danish host had been unresting, so that men had no
time to prepare for their coming, or even to know what point they
would reach next.

Then I sent by this man urgent messages to the thane that they
should fly coastwards, crossing the river Waveney, perhaps, so as
not to fall into the hands of the host at the first starting, for
Ingvar's horsemen would be everywhere south of this and Thetford.

I rode fast over the bridge, for I feared for Humbert our good
bishop, and when I came near the church the bells jangled, all
unlike the wedding peals that I had heard so lately.

They had found a few late flowers, violets and marigolds and
daisies and the like, and had strewn them before the bride as she
left the church; and they lay there yet with bright hedgerow leaves
to eke them out--but across the path, too, lay the dead body of a
poor churl, dressed in his holiday gear, slain by a spear thrust,
and the church was burning. Now the men who jangled the bells for
help came down in haste, terrified as the fire took hold of the
roof, for the church was all of wood and very old.

When they saw me they ran, thinking me yet another of thei