If Torfrida had feared the effect of her news, her heart was lightened at once as Hereward answered haughtily,—
“England lost? Sussex is not England, nor Wessex either, any more than Harold was king thereof. England lost? Let the tanner try to cross the Watling street, and he will find out that he has another stamp of Englishmen to deal with.”
“Hereward, Hereward, do not be unjust to the dead. Men say—the Normans say—that they fought like heroes.”
“I never doubted that; but it makes me mad—as it does all Eastern and Northern men—to hear these Wessex churls and Godwinssons calling themselves all England.”
Torfrida shook her head. To her, as to most foreigners, Wessex and the southeast counties were England; the most civilized; the most Norman; the seat of royalty; having all the prestige of law, and order, and wealth. And she was shrewd enough to see, that as it was the part of England which had most sympathy with Norman civilization, it was the very part where the Norman could most easily gain and keep his hold. The event proved that Torfrida was right: but all she said was, “It is dangerously near to France, at least.”
“It is that. I would sooner see 100,000 French north of the Humber, than 10,000 in Kent and Sussex, where he can hurry over supplies and men every week. It is the starting-point for him, if he means to conquer England piecemeal.”
“And he does.”
“And he shall not!” and Hereward started up, and walked to and fro. “If all the Godwinssons be dead, there are Leofricssons left, I trust, and Siward’s kin, and the Gospatricks in Northumbria. Ah? Where were my nephews in the battle? Not killed too, I trust?”
“They were not in the battle.”
“Not with their new brother-in-law? Much he has gained by throwing away the Swan-neck, like a base hound as he was, and marrying my pretty niece. But where were they?”