“I tell thee, Hilda,” said the Earl, impatiently, “I tell thee that I renounce henceforth all faith save in Him whose ways are concealed from our eyes. Thy seid and thy galdra have not guarded me against peril, nor armed me against sin. Nay, perchance—but peace: I will no more tempt the dark art, I will no more seek to disentangle the awful truth from the juggling lie. All so foretold me I will seek to forget,—hope from no prophecy, fear from no warning. Let the soul go to the future under the shadow of God!”
“Pass on thy way as thou wilt, its goal is the same, whether seen or unmarked. Peradventure thou art wise,” said the Vala, gloomily.
“For my country’s sake, heaven be my witness, not my own,” resumed the Earl, “I have blotted my conscience and sullied my truth. My country alone can redeem me, by taking my life as a thing hallowed evermore to her service. Selfish ambition do I lay aside, selfish power shall tempt me no more; lost is the charm that I beheld in a throne, and, save for Edith—”
“No! not even for Edith,” cried the betrothed, advancing, “not even for Edith shalt thou listen to other voice than that of thy country and thy soul.”
The Earl turned round abruptly, and his eyes were moist. “O Hilda,” he cried, “see henceforth my only Vala; let that noble heart alone interpret to us the oracles of the future.”
The next day Harold returned with Haco and a numerous train of his house-carles to the city. Their ride was as silent as that of the day before; but on reaching Southwark, Harold turned away from the bridge towards the left, gained the river-side, and dismounted at the house of one of his lithsmen (a franklin, or freed ceorl). Leaving there his horse, he summoned a boat, and, with Haco, was rowed over towards the fortified palace which then rose towards the west of London, jutting into the Thames, and which seems to have formed the outwork of the old Roman city. The palace, of remotest antiquity, and blending all work and architecture, Roman, Saxon, and Danish, had been repaired by Canute; and from a high window in the upper story, where were the royal apartments, the body of the traitor Edric Streone (the founder of the house of Godwin) had been thrown into the river.
“Whither go we, Harold?” asked the son of Sweyn.
“We go to visit the young Atheling, the natural heir to the Saxon throne,” replied Harold in a firm voice. “He lodges in the old palace of our kings.”
“They say in Normandy that the boy is imbecile.”
“That is not true,” returned Harold. “I will present thee to him,—judge.”