The enraged expressions on the faces of my four returning scouts made me fear the worst. I was not expecting anything like the account they now gave and by the time they had finished, my countenance was as infuriated as theirs.
“Lord, we must make haste,” said the most senior of the horsemen, “for we do not know how deep the filthy pond is.”
“Make sense man!”
Flustered and agitated, he began again,
“We searched from one village to the next until we came to Linton—a putrid place of unspeakable stenches—and there we found our comrades…”
My patience is always thin, I snapped,
“So, where are they?”
“In the pond, Lord.”
“In the pond!”
“Ay, a foul and stagnant place.”
I seemed to remember Wulfnod mentioning the village as a place where flax was made into linen and so, my man must have
