and Rosamund will not lack for them. Nor do I think that our
uncle would forbid you, if she wills it, seeing that you are the
properest man and the bravest in all this country side."

"Except my brother Godwin, who is all these things, and good and
learned to boot, which I am not," replied Wulf musingly. Then
there was silence for a while, which he broke.

"Godwin, our ill-luck is that you love her also, and that you
thought the same thoughts which I did yonder on the quay-head."

Godwin flushed a little, and his long fingers tightened their
grip upon his knee.

"It is so," he said quietly. "To my grief it is so. But Rosamund
knows nothing of this, and should never know it if you will keep
a watch upon your tongue. Moreover, you need not be jealous of
me, before marriage or after."

"What, then, would you have me do?" asked Wulf hotly. "Seek her
heart, and perchance--though this I doubt--let her yield it to
me, she thinking that you care naught for her?"

"Why not?" asked Godwin again, with a sigh; "it might save her
some pain and you some doubt, and make my own path clearer.
Marriage is more to you than to me, Wulf, who think sometimes
that my sword should be my spouse and duty my only aim."

"Who think, having a heart of gold, that even in such a thing as
this you will not bar the path of the brother whom you love. Nay,