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Page 14
'"None," said they all. "She bade us hang thee if our master died. And
we would have hanged thee. There is no more to it."
'As I stood doubting, a woman ran down from the oak wood above the
King's Hill yonder, and cried out that some Normans were driving off the
swine there.
'"Norman or Saxon," said I, "we must beat them back, or they will rob us
every day. Out at them with any arms ye have!" So I loosed those three
carles and we ran together, my men-at-arms and the Saxons with bills and
axes which they had hidden in the thatch of their huts, and Hugh led
them. Half-way up the King's Hill we found a false fellow from
Picardy--a sutler that sold wine in the Duke's camp--with a dead
knight's shield on his arm, a stolen horse under him, and some ten or
twelve wastrels at his tail, all cutting and slashing at the pigs. We
beat them off, and saved our pork. One hundred and seventy pigs we saved
in that great battle.' Sir Richard laughed.
'That, then, was our first work together, and I bade Hugh tell his folk
that so would I deal with any man, knight or churl, Norman or Saxon, who
stole as much as one egg from our valley. Said he to me, riding home:
"Thou hast gone far to conquer England this evening." I answered:
"England must be thine and mine, then. Help me, Hugh, to deal aright
with these people. Make them to know that if they slay me De Aquila will
surely send to slay them, and he will put a worse man in my place."
"That may well be true," said he, and gave me his hand. "Better the
devil we know than the devil we know not, till we can pack you Normans
home." And so, too, said his Saxons; and they laughed as we drove the
pigs downhill. But I think some of them, even then, began not to hate
me.'
'I like Brother Hugh,' said Una, softly.
'Beyond question he was the most perfect, courteous, valiant, tender,
and wise knight that ever drew breath,' said Sir Richard, caressing the
sword. 'He hung up his sword--this sword--on the wall of the Great Hall,
because he said it was fairly mine, and never he took it down till De
Aquila returned, as I shall presently show. For three months his men and
mine guarded the valley, till all robbers and nightwalkers learned there
was nothing to get from us save hard tack and a hanging. Side by side we
fought against all who came--thrice a week sometimes we fought--against
thieves and landless knights looking for good manors. Then we were in
some peace, and I made shift by Hugh's help to govern the valley--for
all this valley of yours was my Manor--as a knight should. I kept the
roof on the hall and the thatch on the barn, but ... the English are a
bold people. His Saxons would laugh and jest with Hugh, and Hugh with
them, and--this was marvellous to me--if even the meanest of them said
that such and such a thing was the Custom of the Manor, then straightway
would Hugh and such old men of the Manor as might be near forsake
everything else to debate the matter--I have seen them stop the Mill
with the corn half ground--and if the custom or usage were proven to be
as it was said, why, that was the end of it, even though it were flat
against Hugh, his wish and command. Wonderful!'
'Aye,' said Puck, breaking in for the first time. 'The Custom of Old
England was here before your Norman knights came, and it outlasted them,
though they fought against it cruel.'
'Not I,' said Sir Richard. 'I let the Saxons go their stubborn way, but
when my own men-at-arms, Normans not six months in England, stood up and
told me what was the custom of the country, then I was angry. Ah, good
days! Ah, wonderful people! And I loved them all.'
The knight lifted his arms as though he would hug the whole dear valley,
and Swallow, hearing the chink of his chain-mail, looked up and whinnied
softly.
'At last,' he went on, 'after a year of striving and contriving and some
little driving, De Aquila came to the valley, alone and without warning.
I saw him first at the Lower Ford, with a swineherd's brat on his
saddle-bow.
'"There is no need for thee to give any account of thy stewardship,"
said he. "I have it all from the child here." And he told me how the
young thing had stopped his tall horse at the Ford, by waving of a
branch, and crying that the way was barred. "And if one bold, bare babe
be enough to guard the Ford in these days, thou hast done well," said
he, and puffed and wiped his head.
'He pinched the child's cheek, and looked at our cattle in the flat by
the river.
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