So at last I went to her home to find out how I should fare, thinking less of the matter than last time, and there she sat in the hall, chatting merrily with Erpwald.  That pleasantness stopped when I came in, and after the first needful greetings Elfrida froze again, and Erpwald fell silent, as if I was by no means welcome.  I could see that I was the third who spoils company.  However, the ealdorman came in directly, and I talked to him, and as we paid no heed to those two they took up their talk once more, and presently their words waxed low.  Whereon the ealdorman glanced at them with a sly grin and wink to me, and I understood.

So I went away, for that was enough.  Of course, I was very angry, by reason of the scratch to my pride; for it does hurt to think that one is not wanted, and for a while I brooded over it just as I had done the other day.  Then it came to me that at least I had no reason to be angry with Erpwald, who could know little or anything about me, being a newcomer, and it was not his fault if the girl made a tool of him to scare me away, and after that I found my senses again, rather sooner than before, perhaps.  It was plain that the ealdorman took it for granted that I had no feeling now in that direction, and so others would do the same, which was comforting.  So I supposed that there was no more to be said on the subject by any one, unless Elfrida chose to have the matter out, and set things on the old footing of frank friendliness again.

There I found that I was mistaken at once.  Some one was coming down the lane after me quickly, and then calling my name.  I turned, and there was Erpwald, with a very red face, trying to overtake me, and I waited for him.

“A word with you, Thane,” he said, out of breath.

“As many as you will.  What is it?”

“Wait until I get my breath,” he said.  “One would think that you were in a desperate hurry, by the pace you go.  Plague on all such fast walkers!”

That made me laugh, and he smiled across his broad face in return.

“It is all very well to grin,” he said, straightening his face suddenly to a blankness; “but what I have to say concerns a mighty serious matter.”

“Well, then, get it done with,” I answered, trying not to smile yet more.

“I don’t rightly know how to begin,” he said in a hesitating kind of way.  “Words are as hard to manage as a drove of forest swine, and I am a bad hand at talking.  Can you not tell what I have to say?”

“Not in the least,” I answered.

It flashed across me that he might have found out who I was, however, and wanted to speak of the old trouble.

“Well,” he said at last, growing yet redder, “the Lady Elfrida is angry that her name has been coupled with yours pretty much lately.”

He stopped with a long breath, and I knew what he was driving at.

“She has told me as much herself already,” I said solemnly.