The Brethren | Page 5

you bring to buy this multitude from

doom? What ransom, and what gift?"
"The ransom of my own blood freely offered, and Heaven's gift of
peace to your sinful soul, O King." And with that outstretched hand she
drew down his keen-edged scimitar until it rested on her breast.
Salah-ed-din awoke, and marvelled on his dream, but said nothing of it
to any man. The next night it returned to him, and the memory of it
went with him all the daythat followed, but still he said nothing.
When on the third night he dreamed it yet again, even more vividly,
then he was sure that this thing was from God, and summoned his holy
Imauns and his Diviners, and took counsel with them. These, after they
had listened, prayed and consulted, spoke thus:
"O Sultan, Allah has warned you in shadows that the woman, your
niece, who dwells far away in England, shall by her own nobleness and
sacrifice, in some time to come, save you from shedding a sea of blood,
and bring rest upon the land. We charge you, therefore, draw this lady
to your court, and keep her ever by your side, since if she escape you,
her peace goes with her."
Salah-ed-din said that this interpretation was wise and true, for thus
also he had read his dream. Then he summoned a certain false knight
who bore the Cross upon his breast, but in secret had accepted the
Koran, a Frankish spy of his, who came from that country where dwelt
the maiden, his niece, and from him learned about her, her father, and
her home. With him and another spy who passed as a Christian palmer,
by the aid of Prince Hassan, one of the greatest and most trusted of his
Emirs, he made a cunning plan for the capture of the maiden if she
would not come willingly, and for her bearing away to Syria.
Moreover--that in the eyes of all men her dignity might be worthy of
her high blood and fate--by his decree he created her, the niece whom
he had never seen, Princess of Baalbec, with great possessions--a rule
that her grandfather, Ayoub, and her uncle, Izzeddin, had held before
her. Also he purchased a stout galley of war, manning it with proved
sailors and with chosen men-at-arms, under the command of the Prince

Hassan, and wrote a letter to the English lord, Sir Andrew D'Arcy, and
to his daughter, and prepared a royal gift of jewels, and sent them to the
lady, his niece, far away in England, and with it the Patent of her rank.
Her he commanded this company to win by peace, or force, or fraud, as
best they might, but that without her not one of them should dare to
look upon his face again. And with these he sent the two Frankish spies,
who knew the place where the lady lived, one of whom, the false knight,
was a skilled mariner and the captain of the ship.
These things did Yusuf Salah-ed-din, and waited patiently till it should
please God to accomplish the vision with which God had filled his soul
in sleep.
Chapter One
: By The Waters of Death Creek

>From the sea-wall on the coast of Essex, Rosamund looked out across
the ocean eastwards. To right and left, but a little behind her, like
guards attending the person of their sovereign, stood her cousins, the
twin brethren, Godwin and Wulf, tall and shapely men. Godwin was
still as a statue, his hands folded over the hilt of the long, scabbarded
sword, of which the point was set on the ground before him, but Wulf,
his brother, moved restlessly, and at length yawned aloud. They were
beautiful to look at, all three of them, as they appeared in the splendour
of their youth and health. The imperial Rosamund, dark-haired and
eyed, ivory skinned and slender-waisted, a posy of marsh flowers in her
hand; the pale, stately Godwin, with his dreaming face; and the
bold-fronted, blue-eyed warrior, Wulf, Saxon to his finger-tips,
notwithstanding his father's Norman blood.
At the sound of that unstifled yawn, Rosamund turned her head with
the slow grace which marked her every movement.
"Would you sleep already, Wulf, and the sun not yet down?" she asked
in her rich, low voice, which, perhaps because of its foreign accent,

seemed quite different to that of any other woman.
"I think so, Rosamund," he answered."It would serve to pass the time,
and now that you have finished gathering those yellow flowers which
we rode so far to seek, the time--is somewhat long."
"Shame on you, Wulf," she said, smiling."Look upon yonder sea and
sky, at that sheet of bloom all gold and purple--"
"I have looked for hard on half an hour, Cousin