’That, then, was our first work together, and I bade Hugh tell his folk that so would I deal with any man, knight or churl, Norman or Saxon, who stole as much as one egg from our valley.  Said he to me, riding home:  “Thou hast gone far to conquer England this evening.”  I answered:  “England must be thine and mine, then.  Help me, Hugh, to deal aright with these people.  Make them to know that if they slay me De Aquila will surely send to slay them, and he will put a worse man in my place.”  “That may well be true,” said he, and gave me his hand.  “Better the devil we know than the devil we know not, till we can pack you Normans home.”  And so, too, said his Saxons; and they laughed as we drove the pigs downhill.  But I think some of them, even then, began not to hate me.’

‘I like Brother Hugh,’ said Una, softly.

’Beyond question he was the most perfect, courteous, valiant, tender, and wise knight that ever drew breath,’ said Sir Richard, caressing the sword.  ’He hung up his sword—­this sword—­on the wall of the Great Hall, because he said it was fairly mine, and never he took it down till De Aquila returned, as I shall presently show.  For three months his men and mine guarded the valley, till all robbers and nightwalkers learned there was nothing to get from us save hard tack and a hanging.  Side by side we fought against all who came—­thrice a week sometimes we fought—­against thieves and landless knights looking for good manors.  Then we were in some peace, and I made shift by Hugh’s help to govern the valley—­for all this valley of yours was my Manor—­as a knight should.  I kept the roof on the hall and the thatch on the barn, but ... the English are a bold people.  His Saxons would laugh and jest with Hugh, and Hugh with them, and—­this was marvellous to me—­if even the meanest of them said that such and such a thing was the Custom of the Manor, then straightway would Hugh and such old men of the Manor as might be near forsake everything else to debate the matter—­I have seen them stop the Mill with the corn half ground—­and if the custom or usage were proven to be as it was said, why, that was the end of it, even though it were flat against Hugh, his wish and command.  Wonderful!’

‘Aye,’ said Puck, breaking in for the first time.  ’The Custom of Old England was here before your Norman knights came, and it outlasted them, though they fought against it cruel.’

‘Not I,’ said Sir Richard.  ’I let the Saxons go their stubborn way, but when my own men-at-arms, Normans not six months in England, stood up and told me what was the custom of the country, then I was angry.  Ah, good days!  Ah, wonderful people!  And I loved them all.’

The knight lifted his arms as though he would hug the whole dear valley, and Swallow, hearing the chink of his chain-mail, looked up and whinnied softly.

‘At last,’ he went on, ’after a year of striving and contriving and some little driving, De Aquila came to the valley, alone and without warning.  I saw him first at the Lower Ford, with a swineherd’s brat on his saddle-bow.