The Keepers of the People

1460Many villages had been stripped of their workers; and the harvest was ripe in the fields. It was his task to bring harvesters, the young, unmarried men, from the villages which war had not unmanned, to those which had lost their workers, in such a fashion that there was an equal number of young men in each of the districts. He was helped by the eagerness of the people to aid one another: as he had foreseen, the war had knit them together; and the young men made little of leaving their homes to help gather the crops in distant villages; they went about the business of their neighbours as if it were their own. It came about too, as he had foreseen, that many of them, falling in love with maidens of the villages whither they had come to work, desired to return to their homes no more, but to make their home where they dwelt; and the land bade fair to be again evenly peopled.

1461But for months the labour of repairing the gaps in the people was very heavy. He spent many hours a day in the council-chamber, hearing the voices of the headmen beyond the curtain, telling the troubles and needs of their districts; of the keepers of the aqueducts and highways, short of men to mend breaches, and strengthen weakening points. He gave them his orders very often after talking with Althea, who was always there, lying on her ivory couch, and rarely unready with a suggestion. She considered the needs of the villagers as the mutes recorded them, and fixed the night on which he should ride to each to see how the work was going. She was his unfailing companion on his rides, from which now he could rarely spare a night.

1462Ruth was often with them in the council-chamber, listening to their discussions; she rode with them often; and she read the Books of the Wisdom of the Princes continually. And as she learned more and more of the ruling of the country, her interest in the Varandals began to burn steadily; and her growing understanding of the principles on which they were governed fed the flame. The rides were an ever fresh delight to them: the steady canter, mile after mile, along the grass by the highway, the swift rush of the air past the ears, of the country past the eyes, the scent of the dew-cooled earth, the halts to breathe the horses, the abiding sense that they were together very far from the rest of men, the swift return to prevent the dawn, the supper, the talk, the dreamless sleep were unfailing, exhilarating pleasures; and the continual sharing of them drew them closer together; while the sharing of the keeping of the people grew even a stronger bond between them. In truth, Varandaleel was ruled now by this council of three.