Then I spoke loudly, so as to end the business without troubling these faithful guards.
"I am Redwald of Bures. I think that Eadmund will see me."
"Hush! hush! thane," the boy said.
But there was no need to say more, for the long camp life had sharpened Eadmund's ears to aught unusual. Now I heard the bar of the door thrown down, and Eadmund came out with a cloak round him and his sheathed sword in his left hand.
"Redwald--friend--what is it?" he said.
"Even what we have feared, my prince," I answered, looking at him.
"Where has the blow fallen?"
"At Sandwich. Olaf is there, and the Kentishmen have risen. His word is that he has not enough men."
"Surely Kent and London and Olaf--" he said.
"Eight hundred ships lie in Ebbsfleet. A ship may hold a hundred or but twenty men--not less."