I have heard that
he sent for Griffin at this time; but, as I found, he was gone; and if
the king thought that perhaps the princess would wed him now to escape
from the kitchen knave, he had no chance to bring him forward. I suppose
he could have made out that Griffin, or for that matter any one else he
chose, was such a one as his oath to Ethelwald demanded.
Sore wept Goldberga when she was back in her own place, and at first it
was hard for her to believe that Alsi could mean what he had threatened.
But then she could not forget her dream, and in that she had most
certainly seen the very form of him who stood before her at the high
place last night; and that perhaps troubled her more than aught, for it
seemed to say that him she must wed. But no king's son could he be, so
that there must be yet such another mighty man to be found.
And then in her heart she knew that there could not be two such men,
both alike in all points to him of the vision. And she knew also, though
maybe she would not own it, that if this Curan had been but a thane of
little estate, she could have had naught to say against the matter.
And so at last she found that in her trouble and doubt and wish for
peace she was thinking, "Would that he were not the kitchen knave!"
Now, it chanced that the old nurse had gone out into the town, and was
away all this while, so that she knew nothing of this new trouble; and
presently she was coming back with her arms full of what she had bought,
and there met her Havelok and Withelm, who had been to the widow's, and
were on their way to find me at the gate.
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