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342 "Ay, there will always be welcome for you with us." So we parted, heavily enough, not knowing when we should meet again. There was trouble over all the land as we rode westwards; yet Stoke Courci was safe and quiet, because it was held by a lady only.

And when Sybilla, standing by the drawbridge, saw us come home, her bright face changed as she missed Alan from among us. Presently I told her all that he had done, but she was too wilful to seem glad that he was honoured.

"Well, there is some good in him, after all," she said, and so left me. Unless it was that she repented her old injustice to Alan, I could not tell why she had been weeping when I met her an hour or two later. We might not stay long at Stoke Courci, for there was fighting over all the land. And at last, far away under Lincoln walls, where I won my spurs at the taking prisoner of King Stephen, I met Alan face to face in thickest fight; whereat we laughed and saluted, and passed to either side. I heard Sir Richard hail him also. There were many such meetings in those days.

Presently I saw Alan again&mdash;brought in as a prisoner taken with the King, downcast and almost despairing, for all his cause seemed lost. Then Sir Richard made himself surety for his safe keeping, and he was content to promise to bear arms against our Queen no more.

"Now, I must bestow you somewhere," said our knight. "And we have, as you know, a good dungeon at Stoke Courci. There was also a fair alternative to the said dungeon, if you have not forgotten."

Alan laughed a little then.

"I am a ruined man, Sir Richard, now, and can surely make choice no longer."

"Why, Alan, should I have spoken of it had I not meant to tell you that you may yet choose?"