"I shall not be back till late, possibly not until to-morrow I do not tell you where I am going, in order that if you are asked you may be able truly to reply that I said nothing before I mounted, as to my destination."
It was just mid-day when Wulf drew up his horse before a modest house standing in a secluded position a quarter of a mile from the village of Croydon. Edith met him at the doorway.
"I thank you, Wulf, for answering my request so speedily. There is much that I would ask you about my lord. I hear of him only by general report, for although from time to time I send him messages I give him no opportunity for writing to me, and I know that he has respected my wishes, and has caused no search to be made for me."
"Harold sometimes speaks to me of you, lady, and has in no way forgotten you. He did charge me to find out if I could the place of your abode; not that he would seek an interview with you, but, should there be need, he might be able to send a message." By this time they were seated in the room where Edith spent the greater part of her time.
"It is better that we should not meet," she said earnestly. "His mission is to work and to fight for England; mine to remain apart from all men and to spend my time in prayers for him. I know that he places great confidence in you, as indeed he well may, for I heard how you had saved his life, well nigh at the expense of your own. Is he happy with his new queen?"
"His thoughts at present, lady, are altogether turned to public affairs, and it is well perhaps that it should be so. I do not think that he receives much sympathy from the queen, who cares more, I should say, for her brothers, the northern earls, than for her husband."
"It is scarce a wonder that it should be so," Edith replied; "though it seems strange to me that any woman could live with Harold without loving him with all her heart. And yet she may well feel that she, like Harold, has been sacrificed. There was no shadow of love between them before their marriage, in fact she may even have hated him, for it was he who brought ruin and death upon her husband, the Welsh king. She must know that he only married her in order to gain the firm alliance of her brothers, and that her hand was given by them to Harold without any reference to her feelings. I would that the king were happy, even though it were with another. But it was not for his happiness that I left him, but that England might be one. Is it true that the army is broken up and the fleet scattered?"
"It is true, lady. Save for three or four thousand housecarls, there is not an armed man in readiness to defend England."
"It must be a terrible trial to him."
"It is, my lady. He returned to town yesterday dispirited and cast down at the failure of the work of months."