But in a corner, stuck against the wall, was something which chilled Hereward’s blood a little. A dried human hand, which he knew must have been stolen off the gallows, gripping in its fleshless fingers a candle, which he knew was made of human fat. That candle, he knew, duly lighted and carried, would enable the witch to walk unseen into any house on earth, yea, through the court of King William himself, while it drowned all men in preternatural slumber. Hereward was very much frightened. He believed as devoutly in the powers of a witch as did then--and does now, for aught Italian literature, _e permissu superiorum_, shows--the Pope of Rome. So he trembled on his rushes, and wished himself safe through that adventure, without being turned into a hare or a wolf. “I would sooner be a wolf than a hare, of course, killing being more in my trade than being killed; but--who comes here?” And to the first old crone, who sat winking her bleared eyes, and warming her bleared hands over a little heap of peat in the middle of the cabin, entered another crone, if possible uglier. “Two of them! If I am not roasted and eaten this night, I am a lucky man.” And Hereward crossed himself devoutly, and invoked St. Ethelfrida of Ely, St. Guthlac of Crowland, St. Felix of Ramsey,--to whom, he recollected, he had been somewhat remiss; but, above all, St. Peter of Peterborough, whose treasures he had given to the Danes. And he argued stoutly with St. Peter and with his own conscience, that the means sanctify the end, and that he had done it all for the best. “If thou wilt help me out of this strait, and the rest, blessed Apostle, I will give thee--I will go to Constantinople but what I will win it--a golden table twice as fine as those villains carried off, and one of the Bourne manors--Witham--or Toft--or Mainthorpe--whichever pleases thee best, in full fee; and a--and a--” But while Hereward was casting in his mind what gewgaw further might suffice to appease the Apostle, he was recalled to business and common-sense by hearing the two old hags talk to each other in French. His heart leapt for joy, and he forgot St. Peter utterly. “Well, how have you sped? Have you seen the king?” “No; but Ivo Taillebois. Eh! Who the foul fiend have you lying there?” “Only an English brute. He cannot understand us. Talk on: only don’t wake the hog. Have you got the gold?” “Never mind.” Then there was a grumbling and a quarrelling, from which Hereward understood that the gold was to be shared between them. “But it is a bit of chain. To cut it will spoil it.” The other insisted; and he heard them chop the gold chain in two. “And is this all?” “I had work enough to get that. He said, No play no pay; and he would give it me after the isle was taken. But I told him my spirit was a Jewish spirit, that used to serve Solomon the Wise; and he would not serve me, much less come over the sea from Normandy, unless he smelt gold; for he loved it like any Jew.”