On entering the chamber set apart for him in the convent,
Harold found Haco and Wolnoth already awaiting him;
and a wound he had received in the last skirmish against
the Bretons, having broken out afresh on the road,
allowed him an excuse to spend the rest of the evening
alone with his kinsmen.
On conversing with them—now at length,
and unrestrainedly—Harold saw everything
to increase his alarm; for even Wolnoth, when closely
pressed, could not but give evidence of the unscrupulous
astuteness with which, despite all the boasted honour
of chivalry, the Duke’s character was stained.
For, indeed in his excuse, it must be said, that
from the age of eight, exposed to the snares of his
own kinsmen, and more often saved by craft than by
strength, William had been taught betimes to justify
dissimulation, and confound wisdom with guile.
Harold now bitterly recalled the parting words of
Edward, and recognised their justice, though as yet
he did not see all that they portended. Fevered
and disquieted yet more by the news from England,
and conscious that not only the power of his House
and the foundations of his aspiring hopes, but the
very weal and safety of the land, were daily imperilled
by his continued absence, a vague and unspeakable
terror for the first time in his life preyed on his
bold heart—a terror like that of superstition,
for, like superstition, it was of the Unknown; there
was everything to shun, yet no substance to grapple
with. He who could have smiled at the brief pangs
of death, shrunk from the thought of the perpetual
prison; he, whose spirit rose elastic to every storm
of life, and exulted in the air of action, stood appalled
at the fear of blindness;—blindness in the
midst of a career so grand;—blindness in
the midst of his pathway to a throne;—
blindness, that curse which palsies the strong and
enslaves the free, and leaves the whole man defenceless;—defenceless
in an Age of Iron.
What, too, were those mysterious points on which he
was to satisfy the Duke? He sounded his young
kinsmen; but Wolnoth evidently knew nothing; Haco’s
eye showed intelligence, but by his looks and gestures
he seemed to signify that what he knew he would only
disclose to Harold.
Fatigued, not more with his emotions than with that
exertion to conceal them so peculiar to the English
character (proud virtue of manhood so little appreciated,
and so rarely understood!) he at length kissed Wolnoth,
and dismissed him, yawning, to his rest. Haco,
lingering, closed the door, and looked long and mournfully
at the Earl.
“Noble kinsman,” said the young son of
Sweyn, “I foresaw from the first, that as our
fate will be thine;—only round thee will
be wall and fosse; unless, indeed, thou wilt lay aside
thine own nature—it will give thee no armour
here—and assume that which——”
“Ho!” interrupted the Earl, shaking with
repressed passion, “I see already all the foul
fraud and treason to guest and noble that surround
me! But if the Duke dare such shame he shall
do so in the eyes of day. I will hail the first
boat I see on his river, or his sea-coast; and woe
to those who lay hand on this arm to detain me!”
