ich was easy enough; and having looked
at and measured and weighed her, he would make a true report to Edgar;
that too would be easy for him, since all his power and happiness in
life depended on the king's continual favour. But Ongar stood between
him and the woman he had come to see and take stock of with that clear
unbiassed judgment which he could safely rely on. And Ongar was a proud
and stern old man, jealous of his great position, who had not hesitated
to say on Edgar's accession to the kingship, knowing well that his words
would be reported in due time, that he refused to be one of the crowd
who came flocking from all over the land to pay homage to a boy. It thus
came about that neither then nor at any subsequent period had there been
any personal relations between the king and this English subject, who
was prouder than all the Welsh kings who had rushed at Edgar's call to
make their submission.

But now when Ongar had been informed that the king's intimate friend and
confidant was on his way to him with greetings and loving messages from
Edgar, he was flattered, and resolved to receive him in a friendly and
loyal spirit and do him all the honour in his power. For Edgar was no
longer a boy: he was king over all this hitherto turbulent realm, East
and West from sea to sea and from the Land's End to the Tweed, and the
strange enduring peace of the times was a proof of his power.

It thus came to pass that Athelwold's mission was made smooth to him,
and when they met and conversed, the fierce old Earl was so well pleased
with his visitor, that all trace of the sullen hostility he had
cherished towards the court passed away like the shadow of a cloud. And
later, in the banqueting-room, Athelwold came face to face with the
woman he had come to look at with cold, critical eyes, like one who
examines a horse in the interests of a friend who desires to become its
purchaser.

Down to that fatal moment the one desire of his heart was to serve his
friend faithfully in this delicate business. Now, the first sight of
her, the first touch of her hand, wrought a change in him, and all
thought of Edgar and of the purpose of his visit vanished out of his
mind. Even he, one of the great nobles of his time, the accomplished
courtier and life of the court, stood silent like a person spell-bound
before this woman who had been to no court, but had lived always with
that sullen old man in comparative seclusion in a remote province.