f sinews with sharp knives, not out of
compassion, but in order to subject you to a more terrible punishment.

Despair possessed her, which turned to sullen rage when she found that
the feeling of the people around her had again become hostile, owing to
the report that her non-appearance at the procession was due to the
discovery by Dunstan in good time of a secret plot against the State on
her part. Her house at Bere became unendurable to her; she resolved to
quit it, and made choice of Salisbury as her next place of residence. It
was not far to go, and she had a good house there which had not been
used since Edgar's death, but was always kept ready for her occupation.

X

It was about the middle of the afternoon when Elfrida on horseback and
attended by her mounted guard of twenty or more men, followed by a
convoy of carts with her servants and luggage, arrived at Salisbury, and
was surprised and disturbed at the sight of a vast concourse of people
standing without the gates.

It had got abroad that she was coming to Salisbury on that day, and it
was also now known throughout Wessex that she had not been allowed to
attend the procession to Shaftesbury. This had excited the people, and a
large part of the inhabitants of the town and the adjacent hamlets had
congregated to witness her arrival.

On her approach the crowd opened out on either side to make way for her
and her men, and glancing to this side and that she saw that every pair
of eyes in all that vast silent crowd were fixed intently on her face.

Then came a fresh surprise when she found a mounted guard standing with
drawn swords before the gates. The captain of the guard, lifting his
hand, cried out to her to halt, then in a loud voice he informed her he
had been ordered to turn her back from the gates. Was it then to witness
this fresh insult that the people had now been brought together? Anger
and apprehension struggled for mastery in her breast and choked her
utterance when she attempted to speak. She could only turn to her men,
and in instant response to her look they drew their swords and pressed
forward as if about to force their way in. This movement on their part
was greeted with a loud burst of derisive laughter from the town guard.
Then from out of the middle of the crowd of lookers-on came a cry of
Murderess! quickly followed by another shout of Go back, murderess, you
are not wanted here! This was a signal for all the unruly spirits i