“It would not be unadvisable for you to whet your wits as well,” Frode’s daughter muttered scornfully, and somewhat rashly, since Elfgiva’s wits had been sharp enough to guess the significance of her hand-maiden’s interview with the young English noble, and the knowledge had given her a weapon which she was skilful in using.
“Has the sharpness of your mind brought you so much success then, my sweet?” she inquired with her faultless smile; and had the satisfaction of seeing her rebel shrink into silence like a child before a rod.
The crowding of the highway became more noticeable as they neared the point where the Watling Street swerved from its old course, toward the ford and the little Isle of Thorns, to bend eastward toward the New Gate. Some obstruction at the forking of the roads impeded their progress almost to a walk. After a brief experience of it, Elfgiva spoke impatiently to the nearest soldier.
“Why does it become more crowded when two paths open before us? Why does it not happen that some of these cattle turn down the old way?”
The man shook his head. “I do not think there is much likelihood of that, lady; since the Bridge was built, no one has wanted to use the ford; and there is little else to take that way for, unless you are going to service in the West Minster or to the Monastery.”
“Wanted!” the Lady of Northampton repeated in the extremity of scorn. “Bid them turn into that road at once. They stand some chance of their faces getting clean if they take the ford,—if they also get drowned matters very little. Tell them, seek what they may seek, to take that way instantly, or the King shall punish them for interfering with their betters.”
The man pushed up his leather cap to scratch his head. He was not unacquainted with her custom of sweeping the Northamptonshire serfs off any road she wished to possess, but that struck him as being somewhat easier than dispersing a Coronation mob at the gates of London; and yet to defy her—that was harder than either of them! It was an interposition of his good angel that at this moment provided a diversion.
Randalin broke from her silence with an exclamation: “Thorkel! Yonder!”
Less than fifty paces ahead of them, the grizzled head of the King’s foster-father rose steeple-like above the crowd, while the mighty shoulders of the King’s foster-brother made a bulwark beside it, and the gilded helms of the King’s guard formed a palisade around them. The obstacle in the way was nothing less than a royal detachment drawn up in waiting beside the road.