"Nay, who told the brutal tyrant the truth."
"And what doest thou here?"
"I am come to deliver thee."
"But how?"
"Rise up, cast on your garments."
Hardly knowing what he did, Alfgar obeyed, and when he stood face to face with the stranger, began to lose the uneasy impression that the being who addressed him was otherwise than mortal; for he saw by the light of the lamp that the gleeman bore all the attributes of a living man.
"How came you here?"
"Because I know the secrets of the prison house--knew them before the Danes had murdered the once happy dwellers in this garden of England, which they have made a howling wilderness; hence I escaped the wrath of the furious parricide, whom the saints destroy, with ease, and laughed in security at their vain efforts to take me; but we must waste no time; it yet wants five hours to daybreak; within those five hours we must reach the opposite shore."
"But tell me, I cannot understand, why hast thou braved the wrath of Sweyn? why hast thou cared for me?"
"All in good time, follow me now, I bid thee by the memory of Aescendune."