We waded through the ford again, and wandered down stream once more, looking as we went for the first sign of wheel marks.  I was on the banks above the water by twenty yards, and Erling was at their foot, close to the stream, when we had the first hope of finding what we sought.  I spied a rough farm cart standing idle and deserted fifty yards away from me and the river, in the brushwood, half hidden by it, as if thrust hastily there out of sight; and the very glimpse of the thing, with its rough-hewn wheels of rounded tree-trunk slices, iron bound, made my heart beat fast and thick, for I feared what I might see in it.

I called Erling, and as he ran to me I pointed, and together, without a word, we went to the cart and looked into it.  It was empty, but on its rough floor were tokens, not to be mistaken, which told us that it was indeed the cart which Gymbert and his men had used.  And so we knew that we could not be far from the place where they had hidden the king’s body.

Now, if there had been traces of that burden which would once have led us to its hiding place, the rain had washed them away, and we had naught to guide us.  The turf held no footmarks of men, and it was not plain how the cart had come to this place; for men had been hauling timber and fagots hence, so that tracks were many, and some new.  All round us was wooded, and it seemed most likely that somewhere among the bushes they had found a place; and so for half an hour we went to and fro, but never a sign of upturned ground did we see.

“They brought the cart far from the place,” said I presently.

And at that moment from the palace courtyard the horns called men to their supper, and I started to find how near we were to the walls.  We had wandered onward as we searched, and it is a wonder we had seen no man.  But perhaps it was because this place was mostly deserted, being out of the way to anywhere, that Gymbert chose it.  The traffic of the palace went along the road to Fernlea and the ford of the host there, away from here.  The carting of the wood cut during winter was over now, and it was too near the palace for the deer to be sought in these woods.

“Selred will be waiting me, and all men else will be within the walls,” I said.  “I must go to him.  Will you bide here and search, or risk coming with me, comrade?”

“I come with you, of course,” Erling answered.  “The search can wait.  There is moonlight enough for us to carry it on again this night, if we will, between these showers.”

It rained again as we went through the thickets.  Under cover of the driving squalls we might pass unseen to where the little copse we sought came close to the river.  And we cloaked ourselves against the shower, pulling the hoods over our helms.  None, if we were seen, would take us for aught but belated men hurrying to the hall.

Unseen, so far as we could tell, we came to the edge of the little copse and entered it.  The whole breadth of it lay between us and the palace; and under its trees was pretty dark, for the sun had set.  We turned into the path where I had walked with Hilda, and I half hoped to see the priest there, but it was lonely.  Down that path we hurried and turned the corner, but an arrow shot from the ramparts, and again I saw no one coming.