“It has come down to me from my fathers, Hubert, that it was never the fashion of the women of the north to keep their men to shield them when duty called them otherwhere.  I am helpless in my limbs and heavy, and cannot climb, or be borne up yonder hill to any cave.  Here I stop where I have dwelt these five-and-forty years, to live or die as God pleases.  Get you to your duty, man.  Stay.  Call those wenches and bid them fly inland to their folk, out Burwash way.  They are young and fleet of foot, and no Frenchman will catch them.”

I summoned the girls who were staring, white-faced, from the attic window-place.  In three minutes they were gone, though it is true that one of them, the braver, wished to bide with her mistress.

I watched them start up the street with other fugitives who were pouring out of Hastings, and came back to my mother.  As I did so a great shout told me that the French fleet had been sighted.

“Hubert,” she said, “take this key and go to the oak chest in my sleeping room, lift out the linen at the top and bring me that which lies wrapped in cloth beneath.”

I did so, returning with a bundle that was long and thin.  With a knife she cut the string that tied it.  Within were a bag of money and a sword in an ancient scabbard covered with a rough skin which I took to be that of a shark, which scabbard in parts was inlaid with gold.

“Draw it,” said my mother.

I did so, and there came to light a two-edged blade of blue steel, such as I had never seen before, for on the blade were engraved strange characters whereof I could make nothing, although as it chanced I could read and write, having been taught by the monks in my childhood.  The hilt, also, that was in the form of a cross, had gold inlaid upon it; at the top of it, a large knob or apple of amber, much worn by handling.  For the rest it was a beauteous weapon and well balanced.

“What of this sword?” I asked.

“This, Son.  With the black bow that you have,” and she pointed to the case that leaned against the table, “it has come down in my family for many generations.  My father told me that it was the sword of one Thorgrimmer, his ancestor, a Norseman, a Viking he called him, who came with those who took England before the Norman time; which I can well believe since my father’s name, like mine, till I married, was Grimmer.  This sword, also, has a name and it is Wave-Flame.  With it, the tale tells, Thorgrimmer did great deeds, slaying many after their heathen fashion in his battles by land and sea.  For he was a wanderer, and it is said of him that once he sailed to a new land far across the ocean, and won home again after many strange adventures, to die at last here in England in some fray.  That is all I know, save that a learned man from the north once told my father’s father that the writing on the sword means:—­