The monk pulled his round red face to a devout length. “Why, there is a good woman at the other end of the dale, my son, that labors under a weakness of her limbs; and I have bethought me that it would be a Christian act to fetch her this holy relique I wear about my neck, that she may lay it upon the afflicted members and perhaps, aided by my exhortations, experience some relief.”
“If the question may be permitted me, whither do you betake yourself, my lord?” the old cniht asked.
With the light wand he carried, the young man made a gesture quite around the horizon. “Everywhere and nowhere. After I have been to see what they are doing with that portion of the palisade which I bade them repair as soon as they had finished the barrier, I am—”
“That is something that had clean fallen out of my mind to tell you, Lord Sebert,” Morcard spoke up hastily. “Yesterday, before you had got in from hunting, Kendred of Hazelford came, as spokesman for the rest, to say that inasmuch as the Barn Month is well begun, it will not be possible for them to labor more upon the building; and, by your leave, they will put off this, which is not pressing, until after the time of the harvest.”
It was several moments before the Etheling spoke, and then his voice was noticeably deliberate. “Oh!” he said, “so they ask my leave, but stop at their pleasure?”
“My lord!”—the old man looked at him in surprise—“they act only according to custom. Surely you would not have them neglect the harvest, which waits no man’s leisure, to put to their hands as laborers when there is no present need, now that they have completed the barriers by the stream? What present harm because the drain off the hill has rotted the palisade? All of that part is toward the forest. How? Do you expect some Grendel of the March to fall upon us from that direction?”
The Etheling smiled against his will. “Our foe would needs be a Grendel to reach us from that side.” He struck the wand sharply against his riding-boots. “Oh, it is not that I think the work so pressing.”
“In the Fiend’s name, what then is the cause of your distemper?” Father Ingulph inquired impatiently, as he finished the girding-up of his robes and picked up his staff preparatory to setting forth.
After a moment, the young noble began to laugh. “Why, to tell it frankly, methinks it is more temper than distemper. That they should take it upon them to decide how much of my order is necessary—” He let a pause finish for him, and suddenly he turned with a flourish of gay defiance: “I will tell you how I am going to spend my morning, Morcard. I am going to ride over every acre that is under my hand and see how much I can spare for loan-land. And when I have found out, I will rent every furlong to boors who shall be bound to pay me service, not when it best pleases them, but whensoever I stand in need of it.”
Rubbing his chin, the monk heard him in silence; but the old warrior grew momentarily grave. “Take care that you seem not over proud, young lord. It is in such a mood that Edmund creates thanes.”