"Will you go at once?" he asked.

"No; I will stay for a day or two to lull suspicion. They may watch
us just at first, but if they see that we do as we are ordered with
good-will they will cease to regard us so narrowly; moreover, it
will be needful to know the place well before I devise a plan of
escape."




CHAPTER V.


ROUEN.

For the next two days the lives of the two young Saxons were well-nigh
unbearable. At meals the count by turns abused and jeered at them,
and his companions, following his example, lost no opportunity of
insulting them in every way.

"If this goes on, Wulf," Beorn said as they threw themselves down
on the ground late that night, when the carousal was ended, "I shall
snatch the count's dagger from his belt and bury it in his heart,
though they put me to death by torture afterwards."

"I thought of doing so myself, Beorn, to-night, when he threw a cup
of wine over me. But I said to myself my life is not my own, Harold's
rescue depends on it. We are bound as his men to suffer in patience
whatever may befall us. In another hour I shall try to make my