They sent his arms with mine from Grimsby, thinking
that he also needed them; but he left them with the widow.
Havelok used to laugh if they asked him this, and tell them that it came
by nature, and in that saying there was more than a little truth. So the
housecarls, when they heard how Berthun was wont to treat him, thought
also that he was some great man in hiding, and that the steward knew who
he was. They did not know but that my close friendship with him had
sprung up since he came, and that was well, and Eglaf and he and I were
soon much together. The captain wanted him to leave the cook and be one
of his men, but we thought that he had better bide where he was, rather
than let Alsi the king have him always about him. For now and then that
strange feeling, as of the old days, came over him when he was in the
great hall, and he had to go away and brood over it for a while until he
would set himself some mighty task and forget it.
But one day he came to me and said that he was sure he knew the ways of
a king too well for it all to be a dream, adding that Berthun saw that
also, and was curious about him.
"Tell me, brother, whence came I? /Was/ I truly brought up in a court?"
"I have never heard," I answered. "All that I know for certain is that
you fled with us from Hodulf, the new king, and that for reasons which
my father never told me.
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