“That you are the son of my old friend Leofric of Chester: and the hottest-hearted, shrewdest-headed, hardest-handed Berserker in the North Seas. You killed Gilbert of Ghent’s bear, Siward Digre’s cousin. Don’t deny it.” “Don’t hang me, or send me to the Westminster miracle-worker to be hanged, and I will confess.” “I? Every man is welcome who comes hither with a bold hand and a strong heart. ‘The Refuge for the Destitute,’ they call Flanders; I suppose because I am too good-natured to turn rogues out. So do no harm to mine, and mine shall do no harm to you.” Baldwin’s words were true. He found house-room for everybody, helped everybody against everybody else (as will be seen), and yet quarrelled with nobody--at least in his old age--by the mere virtue of good nature,--which blessed is the man who possesseth. So Hereward went off to exterminate the wicked Hollanders, and avenge the wrongs of the Countess Gertrude. CHAPTER X. HOW HEREWARD WON THE MAGIC ARMOR. Torfrida had special opportunities of hearing about Hereward; for young Arnulf was to her a pet and almost a foster-brother, and gladly escaped from the convent to tell her the news. He had now had his first taste of the royal game of war. He had seen Hereward fight by day, and heard him tell stories over the camp-fire by night. Hereward’s beauty, Hereward’s prowess, Hereward’s songs, Hereward’s strange adventures and wanderings, were forever in the young boy’s mouth; and he spent hours in helping Torfrida to guess who the great unknown might be; and then went back to Hereward, and artlessly told him of his beautiful friend, and how they had talked of him, and of nothing else; and in a week or two Hereward knew all about Torfrida; and Torfrida knew--what filled her heart with joy--that Hereward was bound to no lady-love, and owned (so he had told Arnulf) no mistress save the sword on his thigh. Whereby there had grown up in the hearts of both the man and the maid a curiosity, which easily became the parent of love. But when Baldwin the great Marquis came to St. Omer, to receive the homage of Eustace of Guisnes, young Arnulf had run into Torfrida’s chamber in great anxiety. “Would his grandfather approve of what he had done? Would he allow his new friendship with the unknown?” “What care I?” said Torfrida. “But if your friend wishes to have the Marquis’s favor, he would be wise to trust him, at least so far as to tell his name.” “I have told him so. I have told him that you would tell him so.” “I? Have you been talking to him about me?” “Why not?” “That is not well done, Arnulf, to talk of ladies to men whom they do not know.” Arnulf looked up, puzzled and pained; for she spoke haughtily. “I know naught of your new friend. He may be a low-born man, for anything that I can tell.” “He is not! He is as noble as I am. Everything he says and does--every look--shows it.”