“I refused to go. I could not face again that bleak black North. Beside—but that is no concern of Hereward’s—”
Hereward was on the point of saying, “Can anything concern you, and not be interesting to me?”
But she went on,—
“I refused, and—”
“And he misused you?” asked he, fiercely.
“Better if he had. Better if he had tied me to his stirrup, and scourged me along into Scotland, than have left me to new dangers and to old temptations.”
“What temptations?”
Alftruda did not answer; but went on,—
“He told me, in his lofty Scots’ fashion, that I was free to do what I list. That he had long since seen that I cared not for him; and that he would find many a fairer lady in his own land.”
“There he lied. So you did not care for him? He is a noble knight.”