for now
he would stand alone among his fellows, the heathen thanes; and
most of all Erpwald the priest would be wroth with him for leaving
that which he had held so long. He must meet these men often
enough, and he knew that they would have biting words to hurl at
him, but that thought did not stay him for a moment. It was more
than likely that one or two more would follow him when once the old
circle was broken.

So on a certain day Dicul rode over from Bosham on his mule, and
early on the next morning he set up a little wooden cross by the
spring above the hall, and there my father and I and Stuf, the head
man of the house-carles, who had bided in the old faith for love of
my father, were baptized, Owen and one of the village freemen
standing sponsors for us, and that was a wondrous day to us all, as
I think. For when all was done my father gave their freedom to all
our thralls, for the sake of the freedom that had been given him,
and he promised that here, where he and they had been freed, a
church should be built of good forest oak, after the woodcutting of
the winter to come.

Then Dicul went his way homewards, with one of our men to lead his
mule and carry some few presents for his people to Bosham, and
after he was gone we had a quiet feasting in our hall until the
light was gone. And even as our feasting ended there came in a
swineherd from the forest with word that from the northward there
came a strong band of armed men through the forest, and he held it
right that my father should be warned thereof, for he feared they
were some banded outlaws, seeing that there was peace in the land.
That was no unlikely thing at all, for our forests shelter many,
and game being plentiful they live there well enough, if not
altogether at ease. As a rule they gave little trouble to us, and
at times in the winter we would even have men who were said to be
outlaws from far off working in the woods for us.

Yet now and then some leader would rise among them and gather them
into bands which waxed bold to harry cattle and even houses, so
that there might be truth in what the swineherd told. Nevertheless
my father thought of little danger but to the herds, and so had
them driven into the sheds from the home fields, and set the men
their watches as he had more than once done before in like alarms.

Presently I was awakened, for I had gone to rest before the message
came, by the hoarse call of a horn and the savage barking of t