of the
country? We feel proud of you, Cuthbert; and trust us some day or other
to follow wherever you may lead, and to do some deed which will attain
for you honour and glory, and to show that the men of Evesham are as
doughty as any under King Richard's rule."

"You must be wary, Cuthbert," the earl said to him that evening. "Believe
me that you and I have made a foe, who, although he may not have the
power, has certainly the will to injure us to the death. I marked the eye
of Count Jacquelin during the fight, and again when you were led up to
the king. There was hatred and fury in his eye. The page too, I hear, is
his own nephew, and he will be the laughing-stock of the French camp at
having been conquered by one so much younger than himself. It will be
well to keep upon your guard, and not go out at night unattended. Keep
Cnut near you; he is faithful as a watch-dog, and would give his life, I
am sure, for you. I will myself be also upon my guard, for it was after
all my quarrel, and the fury of this fierce knight will vent itself upon
both of us if the opportunity should come. I hear but a poor account of
him among his confreres. They say he is one of those disgraces to the
name of knight who are but a mixture of robber and soldier; that he
harries all the lands in his neighbourhood; and that he has now only
joined the Crusade to avoid the vengeance which the cries of the
oppressed people had invoked from his liege lord. I am told indeed that
the choice was given him to be outlawed, or to join the Crusades with
all the strength he could raise. Naturally he adopted the latter
alternative; but he has the instincts of the robber still, and will do us
an evil turn, if he have the chance."

Two days later the great army broke up its camp and marched south. After
a week's journeying they encamped near a town, and halted there two or
three days in order to collect provisions for the next advance; for the
supplies which they could obtain in the country districts were wholly
insufficient for so great a host of men. Here the armies were to
separate, the French marching to Genoa, the English to Marseilles, the
town at which they were to take ship.

One evening the earl sent Cuthbert with a message for another English
lord, staying in the town at the palace of the bishop, who was a friend
of his.

Cnut accompanied Cuthbert, for he now made a point of seldom letting him
out of his sight. It was light when they reached the bi