ol.
What would you then do?"

"I would return to my old home," Cuthbert said. "My lady mother is, I
trust, still alive. But I will not appear at her house, but will take
refuge in the forest there. Cnut, and the archers with him, were all at
one time outlaws living there, and I doubt not that there are many good
men and true still to be found in the woods. Others will assuredly join
when they learn that Cnut is there, and that they are wanted to strike a
blow for my rights. I shall then bide my time. I will keep a strict watch
over the castle and over the convent. As the abbess is a friend and
relative of Lady Margaret's, I may obtain an interview with her, and warn
her of the dangers that await her, and ask if she be willing to fulfil
the promise of her father, and King Richard's will, in accepting me as
her husband when due time shall arrive, and whether she will be willing
that I should take such steps as I may to deliver her from the
persecution of Sir Rudolph. If, as I trust, she assents to this, I will
keep a watch over the convent as well as the castle, and can then either
attack the latter, or carry her off from the former, as the occasion may
appear to warrant. There are plenty of snug cottages round the forest,
where she can remain in concealment in the care of some good farmer's
wife for months, and we shall be close at hand to watch over her. With
the aid of the forest men, Sir Walter took the castle of Sir John of
Wortham; and although Evesham is a far grander pile than that, yet
methinks it could be carried by a sudden assault; and we know more of war
now than we did then. Prince John may deny me the right of being the Earl
of Evesham; but methinks before many months I can, if I choose, become
its master."

"Be not too hasty in that matter," Sir Baldwin said. "You might capture
the castle with the aid of your outlaws; but you could scarcely hold it.
The prince has, ere now, with the aid of those faithful to him and his
foreign mercenaries, captured stronger holds than that of Evesham; and if
you turn his favourite out, you would have a swarm of hornets around you
such as the walls of Evesham could not keep out. It would therefore be
worse than useless for you to attempt what would be something like an
act of rebellion against Prince John's authority, and would give him what
now he has no excuse for, a ground for putting a price upon your
head--and cutting it off if he got the opportunity. You might now pr