p had worn off the feeling,
but it came back to me as I looked on these men, and most of all on
this Rorik; so that for a little I hated myself for being in their
company to make war on peaceful Christian folk, though, indeed, I
could well excuse myself, seeing what straits had thrown me thus
among them to follow the ways of my own forefathers, Hengist's men.

These newcomers held long counsel with Halfden and Thormod, and the
end of it was that they agreed to sail in company, making a raid on
the English coast, and first of all on the South Saxon shores,
behind the island that men call Wight. And that was the thing that
I had feared most of all, so that as I sat silent and listened,
taking no part, as I might, in the planning, my heart seemed like
to break for the hardness of it.

Yet I set my face, saying naught, so that presently Rorik looked
over at me and laughed, crying in a kind of idle jest:

"Silent is our friend here, though he looks mighty grim, so that I
doubt not he will be glad to swing that big axe of his ashore."

Now I was in ill company, and must fit my speech to theirs,
answering truly enough:

"It seems to me that some of us here were a little downcast when we
found that you were no Northmen, for we looked for a fight."

Whereon they all laughed, and Rorik said that maybe his men had the
same longing, but that we would make a great raid between us. And
so the matter passed, and he and his men went back to their ship,
and we headed over to the English shore together.

CHAPTER IV. THE SONG OF THE BOSHAM BELL.

There is a wondrous joy in the heart of a man who sees his own land
again after long days at sea, but none of that joy might be mine as
the long lines of the South Downs showed blue through the haze of
the late September day. Only the promise of Lodbrok's son, that on
English shores I should not fight, helped me a little, else should
I have been fain to end it all, axe to axe with Rorik on the narrow
deck just now, or in some other way less manful, that would never
have come into my mind but for the sore grief that I was in. And
these thoughts are not good to look back upon, and, moreover, I
should have fully trusted my friend Halfden Lodbroksson.

Hardest of all was it to me when I knew where our landing was to be
made; for if Glastonbury is the most holy place in Wessex, so
should Bosham, the place of Wilfrith the Saint, be held in
reverence by every South Saxon; because there,