“This is hasty, my princess,” Mord said.  “Whither are we bound?”

“For Grimsby, Mord,” I answered quickly.  “Are there no more horses to be had?”

“Never a one, unless we steal from the king,” he answered.

The people were crowding out now that they might see the start, and I saw Berthun speak to a man among them who was a stranger to me.  And from him he turned directly with a glad face.

“Go down to such a hostelry,” he said to me, “and there ask for what horses you will.  Maybe I shall have to follow you for my part in this matter—­that is, if I am not put in the dungeon.”

“Faith,” I answered, “better had you come with us than run that risk.  Alsi is in a bad mood.”

He shook his head; and then the people behind him made way, for the king was coming.

“Almost had you forgotten this,” he said; “and I think you will want it.”

The men with the money were there, and he waved his hand to them.  Havelok lifted the princess to her horse without heeding him, and the men set the bags on the pack horses.

“See the bridegroom down the street, you who were his witnesses,” the king went on, with a curling lip; “and if you are a wise man, master Berthun, you will not come back again.”

Berthun bowed and went into the hail, past the king, and across to his own door, without a word.  After him the thronging people closed up, and though I thought that a housecarl would have been sent to see what he was about, this would have made an open talk, and Alsi forbore.

“Let Havelok take your horse, Mord,” I whispered to him; “I will tell you why directly.”

He nodded, and I told Havelok to mount.  Then I helped up the nurse, who wept and muttered to herself; and so we started, Alsi standing on the steps with words of feigned goodspeed as we did so.

But the housecarls and the people shouted with wishes that were real, no doubt thinking that we were bound for the far-off kingdom of the prince who had won Goldberga by service as a kitchen knave in her uncle’s hall for very love of her.

Directly we were outside the gate that leads down the hill, I saw Withelm, who was there waiting for me, and he knew at once what had happened.

He came to my side, and asked only, “Already?”

“Already,” I answered; “but it is well.  Go to the widow’s straightway, and bring Havelok’s arms to him at the hostelry at the end of the marketplace, where we have to find more horses.”

He went at once, and silently we came down the street and to the courtyard of the inn.  Some few folk stared at us; but the princess was hardly known here, and she had cast her long, white mantle hoodwise over her head and face, so that one could not tell who she was.  So early in the day there were few people in the marketplace either.

Berthun was in the courtyard of the inn, and I was glad to see him, for I did not know what would happen to him.  It was likely that Alsi would seek for someone on whom to visit his anger at the way things had gone.  But the steward had been warned, and was not one to run any risk.