yet hath grown doubtful or dim the prophecy, that the truth
pledged by the grave shall be fulfilled."

"Oh, tempt not! Oh, delude not!" cried Edith, while the blood rushed
over her brow. "Thou knowest this can not be. Another's! he is
another's! and in the words thou hast uttered there is deadly sin."

"There is no sin in the resolves of a fate that rules us in spite of
ourselves. Tarry only till the year bring round the birth-day of Harold;
for my sayings shall be ripe with the grape, and when the feet of the
vineherd are red in the Month of the Vine [221], the Nornas shall knit ye
together again!"

Edith clasped her hands mutely, and looked hard into the face of
Hilda,--looked and shuddered she knew not why.

The boat landed on the eastern shore of the river, beyond the walls of
the city, and then Edith bent her way to the holy walls of Waltham. The
frost was sharp in the glitter of the unwarming sun; upon leafless boughs
hung the barbed ice-gems; and the crown was on the brows of Harold! and
at night, within the walls of the convent, Edith heard the hymns of the
kneeling monks; and the blasts howled, and the storm arose, and the
voices of destroying hurricanes were blent with the swell of the choral
hymns.

CHAPTER IV.

Tostig sate in the halls of Bruges, and with him sate Judith, his haughty
wife. The Earl and his Countess were playing at chess, (or the game
resembling it, which amused the idlesse of that age,) and the Countess
had put her lord's game into mortal disorder, when Tostig swept his hand
over the board, and the pieces rolled on the floor.

"That is one way to prevent defeat," said Judith, with a half smile and
half frown.

"It is the way of the bold and the wise, wife mine," answered Tostig,
rising, "let all be destruction where thou thyself canst win not! Peace
to these trifles! I cannot keep my mind to the mock fight; it flies to
the real. Our last news sours the taste of the wine, and steals the
sleep from my couch. It says that Edward cannot live through the winter,
and that all men bruit abroad, there can be no king save Harold my
brother."

"And will thy brother as King give to thee again thy domain as Earl?"

"He must!" answered Tostig, "and, despite all our breaches, with soft
message he will. For Harold has the heart of the Saxon, to which the
sons of one father are dear; and Githa, my mother, when we first fled,
controlled the voice of my revenge, and bade me wait pa