The Lady Godiva sat crouched together, all but alone,--for her
bower-maidens had fled or been carried off long since,--upon a low stool
beside a long dark thing covered with a pall. So utterly crushed was she,
that she did not even lift up her head as Hereward entered.
He placed his ghastly burden reverently beneath the pall, and then went
and knelt before his mother.
For a while neither spoke a word. Then the Lady Godiva suddenly drew back
her hood, and dropping on her knees, threw her arms round Hereward's neck,
and wept till she could weep no more.
"Blessed strong arms," sobbed she at last, "around me! To feel something
left in the world to protect me; something left in the world which loves
me."
"You forgive me, mother?"
"You forgive me? It was I, I who was in fault,--I, who should have
cherished you, my strongest, my bravest, my noblest,--now my all."
"No, it was all my fault; and on my head is all this misery. If I had been
here, as I ought to have been, all this might have never happened."
"You would only have been murdered too. No: thank God you were away; or
God would have taken you with the rest. His arm is bared against me, and
His face turned away from me. All in vain, in vain! Vain to have washed my
hands in innocency, and worshipped Him night and day.
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