and we will
clear the road."

"Swords out, master?" said Thrand.

"No, spear butts ready; maybe they are friends. But I am in a
hurry."

So we rode over those four men, and I fear they were hurt, for we
left two rolling horse and two men in the road. Nor did I ever know
if they were Edric's men or not. Howbeit, their swords were drawn,
and so I think we were not wrong in what we did, though the
Colchester men smote hard, and my spear shaft was badly sprung over
a helm.

After that we did not draw rein till we came to our comrades, and
they were halfway back to Stamford looking for me. Then we took the
road to London, for we would not tarry now at Peterborough.

Maybe my story would have had a different end had I gone there--but
it was not to be. Yet, though I knew it not, I was close to Hertha
at that time.

Chapter 10: The Flight From London.

I came back to Olaf while he gathered his ships in the Pool below
London Bridge, and I found him ill at ease and angry with Ethelred
and Eadmund, and when I told him all, most angry with Streone.

"Now you must stay with me, cousin, for that man will have you
slain if he can. There is no doubt that he works for Cnut. And this
word of his about a bribe for me is not his own invention; he has
been told to make it."

Then he told me of the vast host that had poured into Kent. It was
the greatest host that had ever landed on English shores--greater
even than had been ours when we Angles left our old home a desert,
and came over to this new land and took it. Olaf and the Kentish
levies had fought and had been driven back, and now day by day we
looked to see Cnut's armies before London, and also for the coming
of Eadmund with his men. But neither came, for the Mercian levies
would not fight unless the king himself headed them, and Cnut
passed through Surrey into Wessex and none could withstand him.

Aye, they fought him. Wessex is covered with nameless battlefields;
but ere long half of Cnut's fleet was sent round to the Severn, and
Ethelred, sick and despairing, came back to London with but a few
men.

It angers me even to think of what befell after that. Eadmund and
Streone gathered each a good force, and came together within touch
of Cnut. And then on the eve of battle, Edric made known his plan
to his Mercian thanes, and that was nothing more nor less than that
they should go over bodily to Cnut when the fight began. Which
treachery so wrought on the honest