Weak and dazed and feeble, both in body and mind, from the exhausting and wasting illness that had followed the severe winter’s campaign, Wendot knew not if this vision was but the figment of his own brain, or whether the passionate love he felt rising up in his heart was lavished upon a mere phantom.  But so long as she flitted about him he was content to lie and watch her, with the light of a great happiness in his eyes; and once when he had called her name —­ the never forgotten name of Gertrude —­ he had thought that she had come and taken his hand and had bent over him with a wonderful light in her eyes, but the very effort he made to rise up and grasp her hands, and learn if indeed it were a creature of flesh and blood, had resulted in a lapse back into unconsciousness, and he was silent as to the vision even to Griffeth, lest perchance he should have to learn that it was but a fevered dream, and that there was no Gertrude within the castle walls at all.

But Gertrude knew all; it was no dream to her.  She saw the love light in the eyes dearest to her in the world.  She had heard her name called; she had seen that the love she had cherished for the hero of her childhood had not been cherished in vain.  Perhaps Wendot had betrayed more in his sickness and weakness than he would have allowed himself to do in his strength, knowing himself a helpless, landless prisoner in the hands of the stern monarch who occupied England’s throne.  But be that as it may, Gertrude had read his secret and was happy, though with such a chastened happiness as alone was possible to one who knew the peril in which her lover lay, and how hopeless even Alphonso thought it to obtain for him the king’s pardon.

“My father would have betrothed us as children,” said Gertrude, her face glowing, but her voice steady and soft, for why should she be ashamed of the faithful love of a lifetime?

“When we saw each other again he would have plighted us, but for the fear of what Llewelyn and Howel would do.  But think you I love him less for his love to his country?  Think you that I have aught to reproach him with, when I know how he was forced into rebellion by others?  I care not what he has done.  I love him, and I know that he loves me.  Sooner would I share a prison with him than a palace with any man beside; yet I fear that in prison walls he will pine and die, even as a caged eagle, and it is that fear which breaks my heart.

“O Griffeth, Griffeth, if you can save him, how we will bless you from, our hearts!  Give him to me, and I will guard and cherish him.  I have wealth and lands for us both.  Only his liberty is lacking —­”

“And that we will strive to compass yet,” said Alphonso gently.  “Fear not, sweet Gertrude, and betray not thyself.  Only remember from this time forward that Wendot is my friend and companion here, and that thy lover Griffeth lieth in yon chamber, sick and stricken.”

“I will remember,” she answered resolutely; and so the change of identity was accomplished, with the result that the old chroniclers aver that Wendot, eldest son of Res Vychan, died in the king’s prison in England, whilst all that is known of the fate of Griffeth is that he was with his brother in captivity in England in the year 1283, after which his name completely disappears, and no more is known of him, good or bad.