Great Britain -- History -- Medieval period, 1066-1485 -- Juvenile fiction
"Take each of thee a street," he said, "and I will take another. Search
as well and thoroughly as ye can for one hour, and then come to this
point to go with me to the ships. We have had many toils to catch them.
They must not escape us now."
"And what do we?" asked Herebald.
Now Richard Wood was quite determined that the Saxons should not share
in the reward, so he answered: "Stand ye here, and watch all who pass.
Let none escape ye."
"That were an easy task," growled Bernulf. "But why may we not also
take each man his street, and knock and 'by-your-leave' with the rest
of ye? It is because we be Saxons that ye put this slight upon us." And
he affected to be greatly displeased.
"Peace, man!" said Richard Wood, more pacifically. "It is true ye be
Saxons, but that is by the will of heaven. And ye be in nowise to blame
therefor. So should ye bear with patience the lot of Saxons."
"Which is to wait on Normans, as ye would say," retorted Bernulf,
scornfully. "But we bide here, as thou hast said."
"The hinds be jealous," said Richard Wood, as he hastened up the little
street he had chosen, looking narrowly about him for the house, in his
judgment, most likely to be the hiding-place of the runaways. About
half-way up the street he espied it, but when, in the king's name, he
entered, he found nothing to reward him for his pains. Wherever he
stopped he fared no better, and he was fain to believe, at last, the
asseverations of the inhabitants that there were not only no runaways
in that street, but that none were to be found in all Yarmouth,--a town
which, according to them, was a most proper place, where those who
could not give a good account of themselves never ventured. Unless,
indeed, it might be a few Frenchmen now and then, and, as they told him
with much garrulity, every Englishman knew what to expect from the
French. And then they asked him if those he sought were French. And
when he said that they were not, they began at the beginning and went
all over the subject again, telling him what a discreet and proper
place Yarmouth was, and how none such as he was seeking ever ventured
there, until he was like to go distracted, and had not completed the
search of even that one little Row when the hour was up, and he
hastened to the place appointed to meet his men-at-arms. He found that
his experience had been theirs, and, in his disappointment and disgust,
he said some harsh things about Yarmouth tongues, which he estimated as
entirely too nimble.
The two Saxons heard his comments with covert smiles, and followed
along toward the ships.
That morning the ship of Eric had slightly changed her position, and
Bernulf so managed that, when the small row-boat he was bidden to hire
was about to put off from land, Eric's ship would naturally be the
first one boarded.
"Do we go with thee?" asked Herebald.
"Nay," answered Richard Wood. "Here be two men who will row for us. Do
ye stay where ye be and watch."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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