"Into thy keeping give I Algive. Watch well; and when Beorn would work his wicked will, send me tidings, and I will be with them ere harm can come to that lady."
Honeyed words spake Earl Beorn in King Edward's ear, and within the week was Sweyn Godwinson inlawed, and of the King bidden come and welcome.
On the self-same night my lady bade me wit that the hour of her dread was nigh. Now the King's ships were out, ready to fight with Baldwin the Flemish Earl, but in the end King Edward willed not to war with Baldwin, so must the seamen to their own homes. It had so befallen that the King had sent for Harold Godwinson to Sandwich, where he was then dwelling. Earl Harold's seamen were of Devon, and would make Dartmouth on the next day, and thus must Earl Beorn be over them in their ship of war, in Harold's stead. At eventide would Earl Harold yield up his command to Beorn his kinsman, in the haven of Pevensey; and at eventide would Beorn have my Lady Algive come to him aboard this ship.
Then I sent a trusty one in haste with these tidings unto Sweyn.
As the sun was setting, my lady, hooded altogether, and leaning upon my arm, went down to the water-side. In a shed, behind heaped-up timber, crouched we hidden, and watched Earl Harold and his household men land from the tall warship when the shades of night were fast drawing down, and set out for the court of the King. Earl Beorn was left, and four of his men, and they had all eaten and drunken well.
When all was once more still, we crept out, she and I, clomb the ladder that yet hung adown the side, and so aboard the ship of Earl Beorn. In the bows lay the four seamen, heavy with the ale they had drunken: they seemed scarce to mark our going. Now Beorn awaited her astern, in a tent-room strung upon poles and screened on all sides with thick hangings, wherein he had feasted with Harold a little before. At the door of this tent I left her, and ran with all my haste to the ship's side. Beneath my cloak I had carried, so warily, a little lanthorn, whose horn I had shrouded with a scrap of thin red silk. This I waved thrice to and fro, for a token to Lord Sweyn without.
In the twinkling of an eye, he came on out of the darkness, ten of his Danish followers in his wake: swiftly and soundlessly they leapt aboard. They took hold on three of Beorn's men ere they could struggle or cry, gagged them, and bound them fast. The fourth saw we not at all at that time.
Swiftly sped Sweyn towards the Earl's tent, the great battle-axe of a viking in his hand, and I beside him. Even fleeter was I, for I forged ahead, and had torn aside the hangings even as he came up with me. Earl Beorn stood within, flushed and lowering: at his feet knelt Algive, her hood wrested away, and the fingers of his right hand clasped in the short golden curls of her hair. Beside him, as though thrust from his way, was a light trestle-board, yet strewn with bread, broken meats, and drinking-horns: upon this board he leant unsteadily with his other hand. Said he thickly, swaying a little:
"By the hammer of Thor, who dare——"
Then Sweyn glided within, and called full softly and sweetly: "Ho, Beorn Estrithson! Here is Sweyn Godwinson!"