The Brethren | Page 7

them and naught of him came home again save his
heart, which lies at Stangate yonder."
"How better could he die," asked Godwin,"than fighting for the Cross
of Christ? Is not that death of his at Harenc told of to this day? By our
Lady, I pray for one but half as glorious!"
"Aye, he died well--he died well," said Wulf, his blue eyes flashing and

his hand creeping to his sword hilt."But, brother, there is peace at
Jerusalem, as in Essex."
"Peace? Yes; but soon there will be war again. The monk Peter--he
whom we saw at Stangate last Sunday, and who left Syria but six
months gone--told me that it was coming fast. Even now the Sultan
Saladin, sitting at Damascus, summons his hosts from far and wide,
while his priests preach battle amongst the tribes and barons of the East.
And when it comes, brother, shall we not be there to share it, as were
our grandfather, our father, our uncle, and so many of our kin? Shall we
rot here in this dull land, as by our uncle's wish we have done these
many years, yes, ever since we were home from the Scottish war, and
count the kine and plough the fields like peasants, while our peers are
charging on the pagan, and the banners wave, and the blood runs red
upon the holy sands of Palestine?"
Now it was Wulf's turn to take fire.
"By our Lady in Heaven, and our lady here!"--and he Iooked at
Rosamund, who was watching the pair of them with her quiet
thoughtful eyes--"go when you will, Godwin, and I go with you, and as
our birth was one birth, so, if it is decreed, let our death be one death."
And suddenly his hand that had been playing with the sword-hilt
gripped it fast, and tore the long, lean blade from its scabbard and cast
it high into the air, flashing in the sunlight, to catch it as it fell again,
while in a voice that caused the wild fowl to rise in thunder from the
Saltings beneath, Wulf shouted the old war-cry that had rung on so
many a field--"A D'Arcy! a D'Arcy! Meet D'Arcy, meet Death!" Then
he sheathed his sword again and added in a shamed voice,"Are we
children that we fight where no foe is? Still, brother, may we find him
soon!"
Godwin smiled grimly, but answered nothing; only Rosamund said:
"So, my cousins, you would be away, perhaps to return no more, and
that will part us. But"--and her voice broke somewhat--"such is the
woman's lot, since men like you ever love the bare sword best of all,
nor should I think well of you were it otherwise. Yet, cousins, I know

not why"--and she shivered a little--"it comes into my heart that
Heaven often answers such prayers swiftly. Oh, Wulf! your sword
looked very red in the sunlight but now: I say that it looked very red in
the sunlight. I am afraid--of I know not what. Well, we must be going,
for we have nine miles to ride, and the dark is not so far away. But first,
my cousins, come with me into this shrine, and let us pray St. Peter and
St. Chad to guard us on our journey home.
"Our journey?" said Wulf anxiously."What is there for you to fear in a
nine-mile ride along the shores of the Blackwater?"
"I said our journey home Wulf; and home is not in the hall at Steeple,
but yonder," and she pointed to the quiet, brooding sky.
"Well answered," said Godwin,"in this ancient place, whence so many
have journeyed home; all the Romans who are dead, when it was their
fortress, and the Saxons who came after them, and others without
count."
Then they turned and entered the old church--one of the first that ever
was in Britain, rough-built of Roman stone by the very hands of Chad,
the Saxon saint, more than five hundred years before their day. Here
they knelt a while at the rude altar and prayed, each of them in his or
her own fashion, then crossed themselves, and rose to seek their horses,
which were tied in the shed hard by.
Now there were two roads, or rather tracks, back to the Hall at Steeple--
one a mile or so inland, that ran through the village of Bradwell, and
the other, the shorter way, along the edge of the Saltings to the narrow
water known as Death Creek, at the head of which the traveller to
Steeple must strike inland, leaving the Priory of Stangate on his right. It
was this latter path they choose, since at low tide the going there is
good for horses--which, even in the summer, that of the inland track
was not.