“And I sleep on his skin every night.”
“You do, my little Champion? Well, warm is the bed that is well earned. But as for her;—see here, and I’ll tell you. She was Gospatrick’s ward and kinswoman,—how, I do not rightly know. But this I know, that she comes from Uchtred, the earl whom Canute slew, and that she is heir to great estates in Northumberland.
“Gospatrick, that fought at Dunsinane?”
“Yes, not the old Thane, his uncle, whom Tosti has murdered; but Gospatrick, King Malcolm’s cousin, Dolfin’s father. Well, she was his ward. He gave me her to keep, for he wanted her out of harm’s way—the lass having a bonny dower, lands and money—till he could marry her up to one of his sons. I took her; of course I was not going to do other men’s work for naught; so I would have married her up to my poor boy, if he had but lived. But he would not live, as you know. Then I would have married her to you, and made you my heir, I tell you honestly, if you had not flown off, like a hot-headed young springald, as you were then.”
“You were very kind. But how is she an Etheliza?”
“Etheliza? Twice over. Her father was of high blood among those Saxons; and if not, are not all the Gospatricks Ethelings? Their grandmother, Uchtred’s wife, was Ethelred, Evil-Counsel’s daughter, King Edward of London’s sister; and I have heard that this girl’s grandfather was their son,—but died young,—or was killed with his father. Who cares?”
“Not I,” quoth Hereward.
“Well—he wants to marry her to Dolfin, his eldest son.”
“Why, Dolfin had a wife when I was at Dunsinane.”
“But she is dead since, and young Ulf, her son, murdered by Tosti last winter.”