“Then,” said Olaf, “let us march at once and save the thane’s hall.”

“That is well said,” answered the earl, rubbing his hands with glee.  “We will make a full end; there will be no more trouble for many a year to come.”

Then he bethought him of the two ladies, and he called his steward and bade him take them in.  At which, when they would dismount, I went to help the maiden, and was pleased that she thanked me for the little trouble, looking at me shyly.  I think that I had not heard a more pleasant voice than hers, or so it seemed to me at the time.  She went into the house with her mother, and I was left with a remembrance of her words that bided with me; and I called myself foolish for thinking twice of the meeting.

Then the earl and Olaf and Relf began to speak of the best way in which to deal with these plunderers; and as I looked at the stout fair-haired thane it seemed to me that things must have been bad if he had had to fly.

It would seem that his place was some ten miles from Pevensea, lying at the head of a forest valley, down which was a string of the old hammer ponds that the Romans made when they worked the iron.  And the village, or town as he called it, was in the next valley, at the head of the little river Ashbourne, whose waters joined the river which makes the haven of Pevensea.  The town was very old, and had a few earthworks round it, though the place whereon it stood was strong by nature.  The iron workers in the old Roman days had first built there, and they knew how to choose their ground.  Thence, too, the Romans would float their boatloads of iron down to the port of Anderida, as they called Pevensea; and there were yet old stone buildings that had been raised by them.

So if these outlaws chose to hold the place, it was likely that we should have some fighting, though this would not be quite after the manner of forest dwellers, unless it were true that Danes were among them.

“Whether there is any fight in them or not,” said Wulfnoth, “I will have the place surrounded, and let not one get away.”

“That is early morning work,” Olaf answered.  “How many of my men will you have?”

“It depends on what manner of men they are,” said the earl.  “All I know of them yet is that they are good trenchermen.”

That pleased not Olaf altogether, for there seemed to be a little slight in the words—­as though he had come to the earl to be fed only.  And he made a sign to me that I knew well; and I thought to myself that Wulfnoth of Sussex was likely to wish that he had seen our warriors in their war gear before.

Olaf paid no heed to me as I went quickly down to the ships.  The men were lying about and watching the sky, for it was changing.  But at one word from me there was no more listlessness; and Rani called them to quarters.  I would that in the English levies there was the order and quickness that was in Olaf’s ships.  Yet these men had been with him for years, and were not like our hastily-gathered villagers.