“What a coil and a clatter has been past me, surely,” he said.  “I doubt there must be a raid over the border, from what I hear the men shouting.”

“More than that, friend,” I said gravely, looking straight at him.  “The Welsh are on us in all earnest, and tomorrow we must meet them somewhere yonder, where the sun is setting.”

He looked at me, and his face flushed redder and redder.

“What, fighting in the air?” he said, with a sort of new interest.

“War,—­nothing more or less,” answered Herewald with a groan.

“I am in luck for once,” he said, leaping up.  “Let me go with you, Oswald; for this is what I have never seen.”

“Hold hard, son-in-law,” cried the ealdorman.  “What of the wedding?”

His face fell, and he stared at us blankly, but his cheek paled.

“Forgive me,” he said.  “I never can manage to keep more than one thing in my head at a time.  Here was I thinking of nought but that, until this news came and drove out all else.  Don’t tell Elfrida that I forgot it.”

“Trouble enough for her without that,” answered Herewald.  “You cannot hold back, maybe, though indeed, not one will think the worse of you if you do so.  We must tell Elfrida what has befallen, however, and she must speak her mind on your doings.  Come, let us find her.”

“Do you speak first, Ealdorman,” I said, and he nodded and went his way.

Erpwald and I followed him into the hall, and there stayed.  He was long gone thence to the bower where Elfrida sat with her maidens preparing for the morrow.

“What will she say?” asked Erpwald presently.

“I think that she will bid you fight for the king, though it will be hard for her to do so.”

“I hope she will, though, indeed, I should like to think that it will not be easy for her to send me away,” said the lover, torn in two ways.  “How long will it take to settle with these Welsh?”

“I cannot tell,” I said, shaking my head.

For, indeed, though I would not say it, a Welsh war is apt to be a long affair if once they get among the hills.

“If we have the victory, I think that the wedding will not be put off for so very long,” I added to comfort him.

He walked back and forth across the hall until Herewald came back, and then started toward him.

“Go yonder and speak with her,” the ealdorman said, pointing to the door whence he came.

Then he went hastily, and we two looked at one another.

“How is it with her?” I said.

“In the way of the girl who helped you slay Morgan,” he said grimly.  “She would hold him nidring if he had not wished to go.”

We went to the door and looked out.  All the road was dotted with men from the nearer villages who came to the gathering, and as they marched, each after the reeve of the place, they sang.  And past the hindmost of them came a single horseman hurrying.  Another messenger with the same news, doubtless.