initial commit of ebook 3055HEADmain

2 files changed, 5296 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/old/wbydw10.txt b/old/wbydw10.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6bcd729
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/wbydw10.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,5296 @@
+The Project Gutenberg Etext of Wood Beyond the World by William Morris
+#7 in our series by William Morris
+
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check
+the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!!
+
+Please take a look at the important information in this header.
+We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an
+electronic path open for the next readers.  Do not remove this.
+
+*It must legally be the first thing seen when opening the book.*
+In fact, our legal advisors said we can't even change margins.
+
+**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
+
+**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
+
+*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations*
+
+Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and
+further information is included below.  We need your donations.
+
+
+Title:  The Wood Beyond the World
+
+Author:  William Morris
+
+Release date: February, 2002  [Etext #3055]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+The Project Gutenberg Etext of Wood Beyond the World by Wm Morris
+******This file should be named wbydw10.txt or wbydw10.zip******
+
+Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, wbydw11.txt
+VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, wbydw10a.txt
+
+
+This etext was prepared by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk,
+from the 1913 Longmans, Green, and Co. edition.
+
+Project Gutenberg Etexts are usually created from multiple editions,
+all of which are in the Public Domain in the United States, unless a
+copyright notice is included.  Therefore, we usually do NOT keep any
+of these books in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance
+of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing.
+
+Please note:  neither this list nor its contents are final till
+midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement.
+The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at
+Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month.  A
+preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment
+and editing by those who wish to do so.  To be sure you have an
+up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes
+in the first week of the next month.  Since our ftp program has
+a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a
+look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a
+new copy has at least one byte more or less.
+
+
+Information about Project Gutenberg (one page)
+
+We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work.  The
+time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours
+to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright
+searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc.  This
+projected audience is one hundred million readers.  If our value
+per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2
+million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-six text
+files per month, or 432 more Etexts in 1999 for a total of 2000+
+If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the
+total should reach over 200 billion Etexts given away this year.
+
+The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext
+Files by December 31, 2001.  [10,000 x 100,000,000 = 1 Trillion]
+This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers,
+which is only ~5% of the present number of computer users.
+
+At our revised rates of production, we will reach only one-third
+of that goal by the end of 2001, or about 3,333 Etexts unless we
+manage to get some real funding; currently our funding is mostly
+from Michael Hart's salary at Carnegie-Mellon University, and an
+assortment of sporadic gifts; this salary is only good for a few
+more years, so we are looking for something to replace it, as we
+don't want Project Gutenberg to be so dependent on one person.
+
+We need your donations more than ever!
+
+
+All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg/CMU": and are
+tax deductible to the extent allowable by law.  (CMU = Carnegie-
+Mellon University).
+
+For these and other matters, please mail to:
+
+Project Gutenberg
+P. O. Box  2782
+Champaign, IL 61825
+
+When all other email fails. . .try our Executive Director:
+Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com>
+hart@pobox.com forwards to hart@prairienet.org and archive.org
+if your mail bounces from archive.org, I will still see it, if
+it bounces from prairienet.org, better resend later on. . . .
+
+We would prefer to send you this information by email.
+
+******
+
+To access Project Gutenberg etexts, use any Web browser
+to view http://promo.net/pg.  This site lists Etexts by
+author and by title, and includes information about how
+to get involved with Project Gutenberg.  You could also
+download our past Newsletters, or subscribe here.  This
+is one of our major sites, please email hart@pobox.com,
+for a more complete list of our various sites.
+
+To go directly to the etext collections, use FTP or any
+Web browser to visit a Project Gutenberg mirror (mirror
+sites are available on 7 continents; mirrors are listed
+at http://promo.net/pg).
+
+Mac users, do NOT point and click, typing works better.
+
+Example FTP session:
+
+ftp metalab.unc.edu
+login: anonymous
+password: your@login
+cd pub/docs/books/gutenberg
+cd etext90 through etext99 or etext00 through etext01, etc.
+dir [to see files]
+get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files]
+GET GUTINDEX.??  [to get a year's listing of books, e.g.,
+GUTINDEX.99]
+GET GUTINDEX.ALL [to get a listing of ALL books]
+
+***
+
+**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor**
+
+(Three Pages)
+
+
+***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START***
+Why is this "Small Print!" statement here?  You know: lawyers.
+They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with
+your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from
+someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our
+fault.  So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement
+disclaims most of our liability to you.  It also tells you how
+you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to.
+
+*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT
+By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
+etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept
+this "Small Print!" statement.  If you do not, you can receive
+a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by
+sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person
+you got it from.  If you received this etext on a physical
+medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request.
+
+ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS
+This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-
+tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor
+Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg Association at
+Carnegie-Mellon University (the "Project").  Among other
+things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright
+on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and
+distribute it in the United States without permission and
+without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules, set forth
+below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext
+under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark.
+
+To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable
+efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain
+works.  Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any
+medium they may be on may contain "Defects".  Among other
+things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
+intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged
+disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer
+codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
+
+LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES
+But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below,
+[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this
+etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including
+legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR
+UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT,
+INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE
+OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE
+POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
+
+If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of
+receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any)
+you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that
+time to the person you received it from.  If you received it
+on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and
+such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement
+copy.  If you received it electronically, such person may
+choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to
+receive it electronically.
+
+THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS".  NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS
+TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT
+LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A
+PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+
+Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or
+the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the
+above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you
+may have other legal rights.
+
+INDEMNITY
+You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors,
+officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost
+and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or
+indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause:
+[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification,
+or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect.
+
+DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm"
+You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by
+disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this
+"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg,
+or:
+
+[1]  Only give exact copies of it.  Among other things, this
+     requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the
+     etext or this "small print!" statement.  You may however,
+     if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable
+     binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form,
+     including any form resulting from conversion by word pro-
+     cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as
+     *EITHER*:
+
+     [*]  The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and
+          does *not* contain characters other than those
+          intended by the author of the work, although tilde
+          (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may
+          be used to convey punctuation intended by the
+          author, and additional characters may be used to
+          indicate hypertext links; OR
+
+     [*]  The etext may be readily converted by the reader at
+          no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent
+          form by the program that displays the etext (as is
+          the case, for instance, with most word processors);
+          OR
+
+     [*]  You provide, or agree to also provide on request at
+          no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the
+          etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC
+          or other equivalent proprietary form).
+
+[2]  Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this
+     "Small Print!" statement.
+
+[3]  Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the
+     net profits you derive calculated using the method you
+     already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  If you
+     don't derive profits, no royalty is due.  Royalties are
+     payable to "Project Gutenberg Association/Carnegie-Mellon
+     University" within the 60 days following each
+     date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare)
+     your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return.
+
+WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO?
+The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time,
+scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty
+free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution
+you can think of.  Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg
+Association / Carnegie-Mellon University".
+
+We are planning on making some changes in our donation structure
+in 2000, so you might want to email me, hart@pobox.com beforehand.
+
+
+
+
+*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*
+
+
+
+
+THE WOOD BEYOND THE WORLD
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I:  OF GOLDEN WALTER AND HIS FATHER
+
+
+
+Awhile ago there was a young man dwelling in a great and goodly city
+by the sea which had to name Langton on Holm.   He was but of five
+and twenty winters, a fair-faced man, yellow-haired, tall and
+strong; rather wiser than foolisher than young men are mostly wont;
+a valiant youth, and a kind; not of many words but courteous of
+speech; no roisterer, nought masterful, but peaceable and knowing
+how to forbear:  in a fray a perilous foe, and a trusty war-fellow.
+His father, with whom he was dwelling when this tale begins, was a
+great merchant, richer than a baron of the land, a head-man of the
+greatest of the Lineages of Langton, and a captain of the Porte; he
+was of the Lineage of the Goldings, therefore was he called
+Bartholomew Golden, and his son Golden Walter.
+
+Now ye may well deem that such a youngling as this was looked upon
+by all as a lucky man without a lack; but there was this flaw in his
+lot, whereas he had fallen into the toils of love of a woman
+exceeding fair, and had taken her to wife, she nought unwilling as
+it seemed.   But when they had been wedded some six months he found
+by manifest tokens, that his fairness was not so much to her but
+that she must seek to the foulness of one worser than he in all
+ways; wherefore his rest departed from him, whereas he hated her for
+her untruth and her hatred of him; yet would the sound of her voice,
+as she came and went in the house, make his heart beat; and the
+sight of her stirred desire within him, so that he longed for her to
+be sweet and kind with him, and deemed that, might it be so, he
+should forget all the evil gone by.   But it was not so; for ever
+when she saw him, her face changed, and her hatred of him became
+manifest, and howsoever she were sweet with others, with him she was
+hard and sour.
+
+So this went on a while till the chambers of his father's house, yea
+the very streets of the city, became loathsome to him; and yet he
+called to mind that the world was wide and he but a young man.   So
+on a day as he sat with his father alone, he spake to him and said:
+"Father, I was on the quays even now, and I looked on the ships that
+were nigh boun, and thy sign I saw on a tall ship that seemed to me
+nighest boun.   Will it be long ere she sail?"
+
+"Nay," said his father, "that ship, which hight the Katherine, will
+they warp out of the haven in two days' time.   But why askest thou
+of her?"
+
+"The shortest word is best, father," said Walter, "and this it is,
+that I would depart in the said ship and see other lands."
+
+"Yea and whither, son?" said the merchant.
+
+"Whither she goeth," said Walter, "for I am ill at ease at home, as
+thou wottest, father."
+
+The merchant held his peace awhile, and looked hard on his son, for
+there was strong love between them; but at last he said:  "Well,
+son, maybe it were best for thee; but maybe also we shall not meet
+again."
+
+"Yet if we do meet, father, then shalt thou see a new man in me."
+
+"Well," said Bartholomew, "at least I know on whom to lay the loss
+of thee, and when thou art gone, for thou shalt have thine own way
+herein, she shall no longer abide in my house.   Nay, but it were
+for the strife that should arise thenceforth betwixt her kindred and
+ours, it should go somewhat worse with her than that."
+
+Said Walter:  "I pray thee shame her not more than needs must be,
+lest, so doing, thou shame both me and thyself also."
+
+Bartholomew held his peace again for a while; then he said:  "Goeth
+she with child, my son?"
+
+Walter reddened, and said:  "I wot not; nor of whom the child may
+be."  Then they both sat silent, till Bartholomew spake, saying:
+"The end of it is, son, that this is Monday, and that thou shalt go
+aboard in the small hours of Wednesday; and meanwhile I shall look
+to it that thou go not away empty-handed; the skipper of the
+Katherine is a good man and true, and knows the seas well; and my
+servant Robert the Low, who is clerk of the lading, is trustworthy
+and wise, and as myself in all matters that look towards chaffer.
+The Katherine is new and stout-builded, and should be lucky, whereas
+she is under the ward of her who is the saint called upon in the
+church where thou wert christened, and myself before thee; and thy
+mother, and my father and mother all lie under the chancel thereof,
+as thou wottest."
+
+Therewith the elder rose up and went his ways about his business,
+and there was no more said betwixt him and his son on this matter.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II:  GOLDEN WALTER TAKES SHIP TO SAIL THE SEAS
+
+
+
+When Walter went down to the Katherine next morning, there was the
+skipper Geoffrey, who did him reverence, and made him all cheer, and
+showed him his room aboard ship, and the plenteous goods which his
+father had sent down to the quays already, such haste as he had
+made.  Walter thanked his father's love in his heart, but otherwise
+took little heed to his affairs, but wore away the time about the
+haven, gazing listlessly on the ships that were making them ready
+outward, or unlading, and the mariners and aliens coming and going:
+and all these were to him as the curious images woven on a tapestry.
+
+At last when he had wellnigh come back again to the Katherine, he
+saw there a tall ship, which he had scarce noted before, a ship all-
+boun, which had her boats out, and men sitting to the oars thereof
+ready to tow her outwards when the hawser should be cast off, and by
+seeming her mariners were but abiding for some one or other to come
+aboard.
+
+So Walter stood idly watching the said ship, and as he looked, lo!
+folk passing him toward the gangway.  These were three; first came a
+dwarf, dark-brown of hue and hideous, with long arms and ears
+exceeding great and dog-teeth that stuck out like the fangs of a
+wild beast.  He was clad in a rich coat of yellow silk, and bare in
+his hand a crooked bow, and was girt with a broad sax.
+
+After him came a maiden, young by seeming, of scarce twenty summers;
+fair of face as a flower; grey-eyed, brown-haired, with lips full
+and red, slim and gentle of body.  Simple was her array, of a short
+and strait green gown, so that on her right ankle was clear to see
+an iron ring.
+
+Last of the three was a lady, tall and stately, so radiant of visage
+and glorious of raiment, that it were hard to say what like she was;
+for scarce might the eye gaze steady upon her exceeding beauty; yet
+must every son of Adam who found himself anigh her, lift up his eyes
+again after he had dropped them, and look again on her, and yet
+again and yet again.  Even so did Walter, and as the three passed by
+him, it seemed to him as if all the other folk there about had
+vanished and were nought; nor had he any vision before his eyes of
+any looking on them, save himself alone.  They went over the gangway
+into the ship, and he saw them go along the deck till they came to
+the house on the poop, and entered it and were gone from his sight.
+
+There he stood staring, till little by little the thronging people
+of the quays came into his eye-shot again; then he saw how the
+hawser was cast off and the boats fell to tugging the big ship
+toward the harbour-mouth with hale and how of men.  Then the sail
+fell down from the yard and was sheeted home and filled with the
+fair wind as the ship's bows ran up on the first green wave outside
+the haven.  Even therewith the shipmen cast abroad a banner, whereon
+was done in a green field a grim wolf ramping up against a maiden,
+and so went the ship upon her way.
+
+Walter stood awhile staring at her empty place where the waves ran
+into the haven-mouth, and then turned aside and toward the
+Katherine; and at first he was minded to go ask shipmaster Geoffrey
+of what he knew concerning the said ship and her alien wayfarers;
+but then it came into his mind, that all this was but an imagination
+or dream of the day, and that he were best to leave it untold to
+any.  So therewith he went his way from the water-side, and through
+the streets unto his father's house; but when he was but a little
+way thence, and the door was before him, him-seemed for a moment of
+time that he beheld those three coming out down the steps of stone
+and into the street; to wit the dwarf, the maiden, and the stately
+lady:  but when he stood still to abide their coming, and looked
+toward them, lo! there was nothing before him save the goodly house
+of Bartholomew Golden, and three children and a cur dog playing
+about the steps thereof, and about him were four or five passers-by
+going about their business.  Then was he all confused in his mind,
+and knew not what to make of it, whether those whom he had seemed to
+see pass aboard ship were but images of a dream, or children of Adam
+in very flesh.
+
+Howsoever, he entered the house, and found his father in the
+chamber, and fell to speech with him about their matters; but for
+all that he loved his father, and worshipped him as a wise and
+valiant man, yet at that hour he might not hearken the words of his
+mouth, so much was his mind entangled in the thought of those three,
+and they were ever before his eyes, as if they had been painted on a
+table by the best of limners.  And of the two women he thought
+exceeding much, and cast no wyte upon himself for running after the
+desire of strange women.  For he said to himself that he desired not
+either of the twain; nay, he might not tell which of the twain, the
+maiden or the stately queen, were clearest to his eyes; but sore he
+desired to see both of them again, and to know what they were.
+
+So wore the hours till the Wednesday morning, and it was time that
+he should bid farewell to his father and get aboard ship; but his
+father led him down to the quays and on to the Katherine, and there
+Walter embraced him, not without tears and forebodings; for his
+heart was full.  Then presently the old man went aland; the gangway
+was unshipped, the hawsers cast off; the oars of the towing-boats
+splashed in the dark water, the sail fell down from the yard, and
+was sheeted home, and out plunged the Katherine into the misty sea
+and rolled up the grey slopes, casting abroad her ancient withal,
+whereon was beaten the token of Bartholomew Golden, to wit a B and a
+G to the right and the left, and thereabove a cross and a triangle
+rising from the midst.
+
+Walter stood on the stern and beheld, yet more with the mind of him
+than with his eyes; for it all seemed but the double of what the
+other ship had done; and the thought of it as if the twain were as
+beads strung on one string and led away by it into the same place,
+and thence to go in the like order, and so on again and again, and
+never to draw nigher to each other.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III:  WALTER HEARETH TIDINGS OF THE DEATH OF HIS FATHER
+
+
+
+Fast sailed the Katherine over the seas, and nought befell to tell
+of, either to herself or her crew.  She came to one cheaping-town
+and then to another, and so on to a third and a fourth; and at each
+was buying and selling after the manner of chapmen; and Walter not
+only looked on the doings of his father's folk, but lent a hand,
+what he might, to help them in all matters, whether it were in
+seaman's craft, or in chaffer.  And the further he went and the
+longer the time wore, the more he was eased of his old trouble
+wherein his wife and her treason had to do.
+
+But as for the other trouble, to wit his desire and longing to come
+up with those three, it yet flickered before him; and though he had
+not seen them again as one sees people in the streets, and as if he
+might touch them if he would, yet were their images often before his
+mind's eye; and yet, as time wore, not so often, nor so troublously;
+and forsooth both to those about him and to himself, he seemed as a
+man well healed of his melancholy mood.
+
+Now they left that fourth stead, and sailed over the seas and came
+to a fifth, a very great and fair city, which they had made more
+than seven months from Langton on Holm; and by this time was Walter
+taking heed and joyance in such things as were toward in that fair
+city, so far from his kindred, and especially he looked on the fair
+women there, and desired them, and loved them; but lightly, as
+befalleth young men.
+
+Now this was the last country whereto the Katherine was boun; so
+there they abode some ten months in daily chaffer, and in pleasuring
+them in beholding all that there was of rare and goodly, and making
+merry with the merchants and the towns-folk, and the country-folk
+beyond the gates, and Walter was grown as busy and gay as a strong
+young man is like to be, and was as one who would fain be of some
+account amongst his own folk.
+
+But at the end of this while, it befell on a day, as he was leaving
+his hostel for his booth in the market, and had the door in his
+hand, there stood before him three mariners in the guise of his own
+country, and with them was one of clerkly aspect, whom he knew at
+once for his father's scrivener, Arnold Penstrong by name; and when
+Walter saw him his heart failed him and he cried out:  "Arnold, what
+tidings?  Is all well with the folk at Langton?"
+
+Said Arnold:  "Evil tidings are come with me; matters are ill with
+thy folk; for I may not hide that thy father, Bartholomew Golden, is
+dead, God rest his soul."
+
+At that word it was to Walter as if all that trouble which but now
+had sat so light upon him, was once again fresh and heavy, and that
+his past life of the last few months had never been; and it was to
+him as if he saw his father lying dead on his bed, and heard the
+folk lamenting about the house.  He held his peace awhile, and then
+he said in a voice as of an angry man:
+
+"What, Arnold! and did he die in his bed, or how? for he was neither
+old nor ailing when we parted."
+
+Said Arnold:  "Yea, in his bed he died:  but first he was somewhat
+sword-bitten."
+
+"Yea, and how?" quoth Walter.
+
+Said Arnold:  "When thou wert gone, in a few days' wearing, thy
+father sent thy wife out of his house back to her kindred of the
+Reddings with no honour, and yet with no such shame as might have
+been, without blame to us of those who knew the tale of thee and
+her; which, God-a-mercy, will be pretty much the whole of the city."
+
+"Nevertheless, the Reddings took it amiss, and would have a mote
+with us Goldings to talk of booting.  By ill-luck we yea-said that
+for the saving of the city's peace.  But what betid?  We met in our
+Gild-hall, and there befell the talk between us; and in that talk
+certain words could not be hidden, though they were none too seemly
+nor too meek.  And the said words once spoken drew forth the whetted
+steel; and there then was the hewing and thrusting!  Two of ours
+were slain outright on the floor, and four of theirs, and many were
+hurt on either side.  Of these was thy father, for as thou mayst
+well deem, he was nought backward in the fray; but despite his
+hurts, two in the side and one on the arm, he went home on his own
+feet, and we deemed that we had come to our above.  But well-a-way!
+it was an evil victory, whereas in ten days he died of his hurts.
+God have his soul!  But now, my master, thou mayst well wot that I
+am not come to tell thee this only, but moreover to bear the word of
+the kindred, to wit that thou come back with me straightway in the
+swift cutter which hath borne me and the tidings; and thou mayst
+look to it, that though she be swift and light, she is a keel full
+weatherly."
+
+Then said Walter:  "This is a bidding of war.  Come back will I, and
+the Reddings shall wot of my coming.  Are ye all-boun?"
+
+"Yea," said Arnold, "we may up anchor this very day, or to-morrow
+morn at latest.  But what aileth thee, master, that thou starest so
+wild over my shoulder?  I pray thee take it not so much to heart!
+Ever it is the wont of fathers to depart this world before their
+sons."
+
+But Walter's visage from wrathful red had become pale, and he
+pointed up street, and cried out:  "Look! dost thou see?"
+
+"See what, master?" quoth Arnold:  "what! here cometh an ape in gay
+raiment; belike the beast of some jongleur.  Nay, by God's wounds!
+'tis a man, though he be exceeding mis-shapen like a very devil.
+Yea and now there cometh a pretty maid going as if she were of his
+meney; and lo! here, a most goodly and noble lady!  Yea, I see; and
+doubtless she owneth both the two, and is of the greatest of the
+folk of this fair city; for on the maiden's ankle I saw an iron
+ring, which betokeneth thralldom amongst these aliens.  But this is
+strange! for notest thou not how the folk in the street heed not
+this quaint show; nay not even the stately lady, though she be as
+lovely as a goddess of the gentiles, and beareth on her gems that
+would buy Langton twice over; surely they must be over-wont to
+strange and gallant sights.  But now, master, but now!"
+
+"Yea, what is it?" said Walter.
+
+"Why, master, they should not yet be gone out of eye-shot, yet gone
+they are.  What is become of them, are they sunk into the earth?"
+
+"Tush, man!" said Walter, looking not on Arnold, but still staring
+down the street; "they have gone into some house while thine eyes
+were turned from them a moment."
+
+"Nay, master, nay," said Arnold, "mine eyes were not off them one
+instant of time."
+
+"Well," said Walter, somewhat snappishly, "they are gone now, and
+what have we to do to heed such toys, we with all this grief and
+strife on our hands?  Now would I be alone to turn the matter of
+thine errand over in my mind.  Meantime do thou tell the shipmaster
+Geoffrey and our other folk of these tidings, and thereafter get
+thee all ready; and come hither to me before sunrise to-morrow, and
+I shall be ready for my part; and so sail we back to Langton."
+
+Therewith he turned him back into the house, and the others went
+their ways; but Walter sat alone in his chamber a long while, and
+pondered these things in his mind.  And whiles he made up his mind
+that he would think no more of the vision of those three, but would
+fare back to Langton, and enter into the strife with the Reddings
+and quell them, or die else.  But lo, when he was quite steady in
+this doom, and his heart was lightened thereby, he found that he
+thought no more of the Reddings and their strife, but as matters
+that were passed and done with, and that now he was thinking and
+devising if by any means he might find out in what land dwelt those
+three.  And then again he strove to put that from him, saying that
+what he had seen was but meet for one brainsick, and a dreamer of
+dreams.  But furthermore he thought, Yea, and was Arnold, who this
+last time had seen the images of those three, a dreamer of waking
+dreams? for he was nought wonted in such wise; then thought he:  At
+least I am well content that he spake to me of their likeness, not I
+to him; for so I may tell that there was at least something before
+my eyes which grew not out of mine own brain.  And yet again, why
+should I follow them; and what should I get by it; and indeed how
+shall I set about it?
+
+Thus he turned the matter over and over; and at last, seeing that if
+he grew no foolisher over it, he grew no wiser, he became weary
+thereof, and bestirred him, and saw to the trussing up of his goods,
+and made all ready for his departure, and so wore the day and slept
+at nightfall; and at daybreak comes Arnold to lead him to their
+keel, which hight the Bartholomew.  He tarried nought, and with few
+farewells went aboard ship, and an hour after they were in the open
+sea with the ship's head turned toward Langton on Holm.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV:  STORM BEFALLS THE BARTHOLOMEW, AND SHE IS DRIVEN OFF
+HER COURSE
+
+
+
+Now swift sailed the Bartholomew for four weeks toward the north-
+west with a fair wind, and all was well with ship and crew.  Then
+the wind died out on even of a day, so that the ship scarce made way
+at all, though she rolled in a great swell of the sea, so great,
+that it seemed to ridge all the main athwart.  Moreover down in the
+west was a great bank of cloud huddled up in haze, whereas for
+twenty days past the sky had been clear, save for a few bright white
+clouds flying before the wind.  Now the shipmaster, a man right
+cunning in his craft, looked long on sea and sky, and then turned
+and bade the mariners take in sail and be right heedful.  And when
+Walter asked him what he looked for, and wherefore he spake not to
+him thereof, he said surlily:  "Why should I tell thee what any fool
+can see without telling, to wit that there is weather to hand?"
+
+So they abode what should befall, and Walter went to his room to
+sleep away the uneasy while, for the night was now fallen; and he
+knew no more till he was waked up by great hubbub and clamour of the
+shipmen, and the whipping of ropes, and thunder of flapping sails,
+and the tossing and weltering of the ship withal.  But, being a very
+stout-hearted young man, he lay still in his room, partly because he
+was a landsman, and had no mind to tumble about amongst the shipmen
+and hinder them; and withal he said to himself:  What matter whether
+I go down to the bottom of the sea, or come back to Langton, since
+either way my life or my death will take away from me the fulfilment
+of desire?  Yet soothly if there hath been a shift of wind, that is
+not so ill; for then shall we be driven to other lands, and so at
+the least our home-coming shall be delayed, and other tidings may
+hap amidst of our tarrying.  So let all be as it will.
+
+So in a little while, in spite of the ship's wallowing and the
+tumult of the wind and waves, he fell asleep again, and woke no more
+till it was full daylight, and there was the shipmaster standing in
+the door of his room, the sea-water all streaming from his wet-
+weather raiment.  He said to Walter:  "Young master, the sele of the
+day to thee!  For by good hap we have gotten into another day.  Now
+I shall tell thee that we have striven to beat, so as not to be
+driven off our course, but all would not avail, wherefore for these
+three hours we have been running before the wind; but, fair sir, so
+big hath been the sea that but for our ship being of the stoutest,
+and our men all yare, we had all grown exceeding wise concerning the
+ground of the mid-main.  Praise be to St. Nicholas and all Hallows!
+for though ye shall presently look upon a new sea, and maybe a new
+land to boot, yet is that better than looking on the ugly things
+down below."
+
+"Is all well with ship and crew then?" said Walter.
+
+"Yea forsooth," said the shipmaster; "verily the Bartholomew is the
+darling of Oak Woods; come up and look at it, how she is dealing
+with wind and waves all free from fear."
+
+So Walter did on his foul-weather raiment, and went up on to the
+quarter-deck, and there indeed was a change of days; for the sea was
+dark and tumbling mountain-high, and the white-horses were running
+down the valleys thereof, and the clouds drave low over all, and
+bore a scud of rain along with them; and though there was but a rag
+of sail on her, the ship flew before the wind, rolling a great wash
+of water from bulwark to bulwark.
+
+Walter stood looking on it all awhile, holding on by a stay-rope,
+and saying to himself that it was well that they were driving so
+fast toward new things.
+
+Then the shipmaster came up to him and clapped him on the shoulder
+and said:  "Well, shipmate, cheer up! and now come below again and
+eat some meat, and drink a cup with me."
+
+So Walter went down and ate and drank, and his heart was lighter
+than it had been since he had heard of his father's death, and the
+feud awaiting him at home, which forsooth he had deemed would stay
+his wanderings a weary while, and therewithal his hopes.  But now it
+seemed as if he needs must wander, would he, would he not; and so it
+was that even this fed his hope; so sore his heart clung to that
+desire of his to seek home to those three that seemed to call him
+unto them.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V:  NOW THEY COME TO A NEW LAND
+
+
+
+Three days they drave before the wind, and on the fourth the clouds
+lifted, the sun shone out and the offing was clear; the wind had
+much abated, though it still blew a breeze, and was a head wind for
+sailing toward the country of Langton.  So then the master said
+that, since they were bewildered, and the wind so ill to deal with,
+it were best to go still before the wind that they might make some
+land and get knowledge of their whereabouts from the folk thereof.
+Withal he said that he deemed the land not to be very far distant.
+
+So did they, and sailed on pleasantly enough, for the weather kept
+on mending, and the wind fell till it was but a light breeze, yet
+still foul for Langton.
+
+So wore three days, and on the eve of the third, the man from the
+topmast cried out that he saw land ahead; and so did they all before
+the sun was quite set, though it were but a cloud no bigger than a
+man's hand.
+
+When night fell they struck not sail, but went forth toward the land
+fair and softly; for it was early summer, so that the nights were
+neither long nor dark.
+
+But when it was broad daylight, they opened a land, a long shore of
+rocks and mountains, and nought else that they could see at first.
+Nevertheless as day wore and they drew nigher, first they saw how
+the mountains fell away from the sea, and were behind a long wall of
+sheer cliff; and coming nigher yet, they beheld a green plain going
+up after a little in green bents and slopes to the feet of the said
+cliff-wall.
+
+No city nor haven did they see there, not even when they were far
+nigher to the land; nevertheless, whereas they hankered for the
+peace of the green earth after all the tossing and unrest of the
+sea, and whereas also they doubted not to find at the least good and
+fresh water, and belike other bait in the plain under the mountains,
+they still sailed on not unmerrily; so that by nightfall they cast
+anchor in five-fathom water hard by the shore.
+
+Next morning they found that they were lying a little way off the
+mouth of a river not right great; so they put out their boats and
+towed the ship up into the said river, and when they had gone up it
+for a mile or thereabouts they found the sea water failed, for
+little was the ebb and flow of the tide on that coast.  Then was the
+river deep and clear, running between smooth grassy land like to
+meadows.  Also on their left board they saw presently three head of
+neat cattle going, as if in a meadow of a homestead in their own
+land, and a few sheep; and thereafter, about a bow-draught from the
+river, they saw a little house of wood and straw-thatch under a
+wooded mound, and with orchard trees about it.  They wondered little
+thereat, for they knew no cause why that land should not be builded,
+though it were in the far outlands.  However, they drew their ship
+up to the bank, thinking that they would at least abide awhile and
+ask tidings and have some refreshing of the green plain, which was
+so lovely and pleasant.
+
+But while they were busied herein they saw a man come out of the
+house, and down to the river to meet them; and they soon saw that he
+was tall and old, long-hoary of hair and beard, and clad mostly in
+the skins of beasts.
+
+He drew nigh without any fear or mistrust, and coming close to them
+gave them the sele of the day in a kindly and pleasant voice.  The
+shipmaster greeted him in his turn, and said withal:  "Old man, art
+thou the king of this country?"
+
+The elder laughed; "It hath had none other a long while," said he;
+"and at least there is no other son of Adam here to gainsay."
+
+"Thou art alone here then?" said the master.
+
+"Yea," said the old man; "save for the beasts of the field and the
+wood, and the creeping things, and fowl.  Wherefore it is sweet to
+me to hear your voices."
+
+Said the master:  "Where be the other houses of the town?"
+
+The old man laughed.  Said he:  "When I said that I was alone, I
+meant that I was alone in the land and not only alone in this stead.
+There is no house save this betwixt the sea and the dwellings of the
+Bears, over the cliff-wall yonder, yea and a long way over it."
+
+"Yea," quoth the shipmaster grinning, "and be the bears of thy
+country so manlike, that they dwell in builded houses?"
+
+The old man shook his head.  "Sir," said he, "as to their bodily
+fashion, it is altogether manlike, save that they be one and all
+higher and bigger than most.  For they be bears only in name; they
+be a nation of half wild men; for I have been told by them that
+there be many more than that tribe whose folk I have seen, and that
+they spread wide about behind these mountains from east to west.
+Now, sir, as to their souls and understandings I warrant them not;
+for miscreants they be, trowing neither in God nor his hallows."
+
+Said the master:  "Trow they in Mahound then?"
+
+"Nay," said the elder, "I wot not for sure that they have so much as
+a false God; though I have it from them that they worship a certain
+woman with mickle worship."
+
+Then spake Walter:  "Yea, good sir, and how knowest thou that? dost
+thou deal with them at all?"
+
+Said the old man:  "Whiles some of that folk come hither and have of
+me what I can spare; a calf or two, or a half-dozen of lambs or
+hoggets; or a skin of wine or cyder of mine own making:  and they
+give me in return such things as I can use, as skins of hart and
+bear and other peltries; for now I am old, I can but little of the
+hunting hereabout.  Whiles, also, they bring little lumps of pure
+copper, and would give me gold also, but it is of little use in this
+lonely land.  Sooth to say, to me they are not masterful or rough-
+handed; but glad am I that they have been here but of late, and are
+not like to come again this while; for terrible they are of aspect,
+and whereas ye be aliens, belike they would not hold their hands
+from off you; and moreover ye have weapons and other matters which
+they would covet sorely."
+
+Quoth the master:  "Since thou dealest with these wild men, will ye
+not deal with us in chaffer?  For whereas we are come from long
+travel, we hanker after fresh victual, and here aboard are many
+things which were for thine avail."
+
+Said the old man:  "All that I have is yours, so that ye do but
+leave me enough till my next ingathering:  of wine and cyder, such
+as it is, I have plenty for your service; ye may drink it till it is
+all gone, if ye will:  a little corn and meal I have, but not much;
+yet are ye welcome thereto, since the standing corn in my garth is
+done blossoming, and I have other meat.  Cheeses have I and dried
+fish; take what ye will thereof.  But as to my neat and sheep, if ye
+have sore need of any, and will have them, I may not say you nay:
+but I pray you if ye may do without them, not to take my milch-
+beasts or their engenderers; for, as ye have heard me say, the Bear-
+folk have been here but of late, and they have had of me all I might
+spare:  but now let me tell you, if ye long after flesh-meat, that
+there is venison of hart and hind, yea, and of buck and doe, to be
+had on this plain, and about the little woods at the feet of the
+rock-wall yonder:  neither are they exceeding wild; for since I may
+not take them, I scare them not, and no other man do they see to
+hurt them; for the Bear-folk come straight to my house, and fare
+straight home thence.  But I will lead you the nighest way to where
+the venison is easiest to be gotten.  As to the wares in your ship,
+if ye will give me aught I will take it with a good will; and
+chiefly if ye have a fair knife or two and a roll of linen cloth,
+that were a good refreshment to me.  But in any case what I have to
+give is free to you and welcome."
+
+The shipmaster laughed:  "Friend," said he, "we can thee mickle
+thanks for all that thou biddest us.  And wot well that we be no
+lifters or sea-thieves to take thy livelihood from thee.  So to-
+morrow, if thou wilt, we will go with thee and upraise the hunt, and
+meanwhile we will come aland, and walk on the green grass, and water
+our ship with thy good fresh water."
+
+So the old carle went back to his house to make them ready what
+cheer he might, and the shipmen, who were twenty and one, all told,
+what with the mariners and Arnold and Walter's servants, went
+ashore, all but two who watched the ship and abode their turn.  They
+went well-weaponed, for both the master and Walter deemed wariness
+wisdom, lest all might not be so good as it seemed.  They took of
+their sail-cloths ashore and tilted them in on the meadow betwixt
+the house and the ship, and the carle brought them what he had for
+their avail, of fresh fruits, and cheeses, and milk, and wine, and
+cyder, and honey, and there they feasted nowise ill, and were right
+fain.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI:  THE OLD MAN TELLS WALTER OF HIMSELF.  WALTER SEES A
+SHARD IN THE CLIFF-WALL
+
+
+
+But when they had done their meat and drink the master and the
+shipmen went about the watering of the ship, and the others strayed
+off along the meadow, so that presently Walter was left alone with
+the carle, and fell to speech with him and said:  "Father, meseemeth
+thou shouldest have some strange tale to tell, and as yet we have
+asked thee of nought save meat for our bellies:  now if I ask thee
+concerning thy life, and how thou camest hither, and abided here,
+wilt thou tell me aught?"
+
+The old man smiled on him and said:  "Son, my tale were long to
+tell; and mayhappen concerning much thereof my memory should fail
+me; and withal there is grief therein, which I were loth to awaken:
+nevertheless if thou ask, I will answer as I may, and in any case
+will tell thee nought save the truth."
+
+Said Walter:  "Well then, hast thou been long here?"
+
+"Yea," said the carle, "since I was a young man, and a stalwarth
+knight."
+
+Said Walter:  "This house, didst thou build it, and raise these
+garths, and plant orchard and vineyard, and gather together the neat
+and the sheep, or did some other do all this for thee?"
+
+Said the carle:  "I did none of all this; there was one here before
+me, and I entered into his inheritance, as though this were a lordly
+manor, with a fair castle thereon, and all well stocked and
+plenished."
+
+Said Walter:  "Didst thou find thy foregoer alive here?"
+
+"Yea," said the elder, "yet he lived but for a little while after I
+came to him."
+
+He was silent a while, and then he said:  "I slew him:  even so
+would he have it, though I bade him a better lot."
+
+Said Walter:  "Didst thou come hither of thine own will?"
+
+"Mayhappen," said the carle; "who knoweth?  Now have I no will to do
+either this or that.  It is wont that maketh me do, or refrain."
+
+Said Walter:  "Tell me this; why didst thou slay the man? did he any
+scathe to thee?"
+
+Said the elder:  "When I slew him, I deemed that he was doing me all
+scathe:  but now I know that it was not so.  Thus it was:  I would
+needs go where he had been before, and he stood in the path against
+me; and I overthrew him, and went on the way I would."
+
+"What came thereof?" said Walter.
+
+"Evil came of it," said the carle.
+
+Then was Walter silent a while, and the old man spake nothing; but
+there came a smile in his face that was both sly and somewhat sad.
+Walter looked on him and said:  "Was it from hence that thou wouldst
+go that road?"
+
+"Yea," said the carle.
+
+Said Walter:  "And now wilt thou tell me what that road was; whither
+it went and whereto it led, that thou must needs wend it, though thy
+first stride were over a dead man?"
+
+"I will not tell thee," said the carle.
+
+Then they held their peace, both of them, and thereafter got on to
+other talk of no import.
+
+So wore the day till night came; and they slept safely, and on the
+morrow after they had broken their fast, the more part of them set
+off with the carle to the hunting, and they went, all of them, a
+three hours' faring towards the foot of the cliffs, which was all
+grown over with coppice, hazel and thorn, with here and there a big
+oak or ash-tree; there it was, said the old man, where the venison
+was most and best.
+
+Of their hunting need nought be said, saving that when the carle had
+put them on the track of the deer and shown them what to do, he came
+back again with Walter, who had no great lust for the hunting, and
+sorely longed to have some more talk with the said carle.  He for
+his part seemed nought loth thereto, and so led Walter to a mound or
+hillock amidst the clear of the plain, whence all was to be seen
+save where the wood covered it; but just before where they now lay
+down there was no wood, save low bushes, betwixt them and the rock-
+wall; and Walter noted that whereas otherwhere, save in one place
+whereto their eyes were turned, the cliffs seemed wellnigh or quite
+sheer, or indeed in some places beetling over, in that said place
+they fell away from each other on either side; and before this
+sinking was a slope or scree, that went gently up toward the sinking
+of the wall.  Walter looked long and earnestly at this place, and
+spake nought, till the carle said:  "What! thou hast found something
+before thee to look on.  What is it then?"
+
+Quoth Walter:  "Some would say that where yonder slopes run together
+up towards that sinking in the cliff-wall there will be a pass into
+the country beyond."
+
+The carle smiled and said:  "Yea, son; nor, so saying, would they
+err; for that is the pass into the Bear-country, whereby those huge
+men come down to chaffer with me."
+
+"Yea," said Walter; and therewith he turned him a little, and
+scanned the rock-wall, and saw how a few miles from that pass it
+turned somewhat sharply toward the sea, narrowing the plain much
+there, till it made a bight, the face whereof looked wellnigh north,
+instead of west, as did the more part of the wall.  And in the midst
+of that northern-looking bight was a dark place which seemed to
+Walter like a downright shard in the cliff.  For the face of the
+wall was of a bleak grey, and it was but little furrowed.
+
+So then Walter spake:  "Lo, old friend, there yonder is again a
+place that meseemeth is a pass; whereunto doth that one lead?"  And
+he pointed to it:  but the old man did not follow the pointing of
+his finger, but, looking down on the ground, answered confusedly,
+and said:
+
+"Maybe:  I wot not.  I deem that it also leadeth into the Bear-
+country by a roundabout road.  It leadeth into the far land."
+
+Walter answered nought:  for a strange thought had come uppermost in
+his mind, that the carle knew far more than he would say of that
+pass, and that he himself might be led thereby to find the wondrous
+three.  He caught his breath hardly, and his heart knocked against
+his ribs; but he refrained from speaking for a long while; but at
+last he spake in a sharp hard voice, which he scarce knew for his
+own:  "Father, tell me, I adjure thee by God and All-hallows, was it
+through yonder shard that the road lay, when thou must needs make
+thy first stride over a dead man?"
+
+The old man spake not a while, then he raised his head, and looked
+Walter full in the eyes, and said in a steady voice:  "NO, IT WAS
+NOT."  Thereafter they sat looking at each other a while; but at
+last Walter turned his eyes away, but knew not what they beheld nor
+where he was, but he was as one in a swoon.  For he knew full well
+that the carle had lied to him, and that he might as well have said
+aye as no, and told him, that it verily was by that same shard that
+he had stridden over a dead man.  Nevertheless he made as little
+semblance thereof as he might, and presently came to himself, and
+fell to talking of other matters, that had nought to do with the
+adventures of the land.  But after a while he spake suddenly, and
+said:  "My master, I was thinking of a thing."
+
+"Yea, of what?" said the carle.
+
+"Of this," said Walter; "that here in this land be strange
+adventures toward, and that if we, and I in especial, were to turn
+our backs on them, and go home with nothing done, it were pity of
+our lives:  for all will be dull and deedless there.  I was deeming
+it were good if we tried the adventure."
+
+"What adventure?" said the old man, rising up on his elbow and
+staring sternly on him.
+
+Said Walter:  "The wending yonder pass to the eastward, whereby the
+huge men come to thee from out of the Bear-country; that we might
+see what should come thereof."
+
+The carle leaned back again, and smiled and shook his head, and
+spake:  "That adventure were speedily proven:  death would come of
+it, my son."
+
+"Yea, and how?" said Walter.
+
+The carle said:  "The big men would take thee, and offer thee up as
+a blood-offering to that woman, who is their Mawmet.  And if ye go
+all, then shall they do the like with all of you."
+
+Said Walter:  "Is that sure?"
+
+"Dead sure," said the carle.
+
+"How knowest thou this?" said Walter.
+
+"I have been there myself," said the carle.
+
+"Yea," said Walter, "but thou camest away whole."
+
+"Art thou sure thereof?" said the carle.
+
+"Thou art alive yet, old man," said Walter, "for I have seen thee
+eat thy meat, which ghosts use not to do."  And he laughed.
+
+But the old man answered soberly:  "If I escaped, it was by this,
+that another woman saved me, and not often shall that befall.  Nor
+wholly was I saved; my body escaped forsooth.  But where is my soul?
+Where is my heart, and my life?  Young man, I rede thee, try no such
+adventure; but go home to thy kindred if thou canst.  Moreover,
+wouldst thou fare alone?  The others shall hinder thee."
+
+Said Walter:  "I am the master; they shall do as I bid them:
+besides, they will be well pleased to share my goods amongst them if
+I give them a writing to clear them of all charges which might be
+brought against them."
+
+"My son! my son!" said the carle, "I pray thee go not to thy death!"
+
+Walter heard him silently, but as if he were persuaded to refrain;
+and then the old man fell to, and told him much concerning this
+Bear-folk and their customs, speaking very freely of them; but
+Walter's ears were scarce open to this talk:  whereas he deemed that
+he should have nought to do with those wild men; and he durst not
+ask again concerning the country whereto led the pass on the
+northward.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII:  WALTER COMES TO THE SHARD IN THE ROCK-WALL
+
+
+
+As they were in converse thus, they heard the hunters blowing on
+their horns all together; whereon the old man arose, and said:  "I
+deem by the blowing that the hunt will be over and done, and that
+they be blowing on their fellows who have gone scatter-meal about
+the wood.  It is now some five hours after noon, and thy men will be
+getting back with their venison, and will be fainest of the victuals
+they have caught; therefore will I hasten on before, and get ready
+fire and water and other matters for the cooking.  Wilt thou come
+with me, young master, or abide thy men here?"
+
+Walter said lightly:  "I will rest and abide them here; since I
+cannot fail to see them hence as they go on their ways to thine
+house.  And it may be well that I be at hand to command them and
+forbid, and put some order amongst them, for rough playmates they
+be, some of them, and now all heated with the hunting and the joy of
+the green earth."  Thus he spoke, as if nought were toward save
+supper and bed; but inwardly hope and fear were contending in him,
+and again his heart beat so hard, that he deemed that the carle must
+surely hear it.  But the old man took him but according to his
+outward seeming, and nodded his head, and went away quietly toward
+his house.
+
+When he had been gone a little, Walter rose up heedfully; he had
+with him a scrip wherein was some cheese and hard-fish, and a little
+flasket of wine; a short bow he had with him, and a quiver of
+arrows; and he was girt with a strong and good sword, and a wood-
+knife withal.  He looked to all this gear that it was nought amiss,
+and then speedily went down off the mound, and when he was come
+down, he found that it covered him from men coming out of the wood,
+if he went straight thence to that shard of the rock-wall where was
+the pass that led southward.
+
+Now it is no nay that thitherward he turned, and went wisely, lest
+the carle should make a backward cast, and see him, or lest any
+straggler of his own folk might happen upon him.
+
+For to say sooth, he deemed that did they wind him, they would be
+like to let him of his journey.  He had noted the bearings of the
+cliffs nigh the shard, and whereas he could see their heads
+everywhere except from the depths of the thicket, he was not like to
+go astray.
+
+He had made no great way ere he heard the horns blowing all together
+again in one place, and looking thitherward through the leafy boughs
+(for he was now amidst of a thicket) he saw his men thronging the
+mound, and had no doubt therefore that they were blowing on him; but
+being well under cover he heeded it nought, and lying still a
+little, saw them go down off the mound and go all of them toward the
+carle's house, still blowing as they went, but not faring scatter-
+meal.  Wherefore it was clear that they were nought troubled about
+him.
+
+So he went on his way to the shard; and there is nothing to say of
+his journey till he got before it with the last of the clear day,
+and entered it straightway.  It was in sooth a downright breach or
+cleft in the rock-wall, and there was no hill or bent leading up to
+it, nothing but a tumble of stones before it, which was somewhat
+uneasy going, yet needed nought but labour to overcome it, and when
+he had got over this, and was in the very pass itself, he found it
+no ill going:  forsooth at first it was little worse than a rough
+road betwixt two great stony slopes, though a little trickle of
+water ran down amidst of it.  So, though it was so nigh nightfall,
+yet Walter pressed on, yea, and long after the very night was come.
+For the moon rose wide and bright a little after nightfall.  But at
+last he had gone so long, and was so wearied, that he deemed it
+nought but wisdom to rest him, and so lay down on a piece of
+greensward betwixt the stones, when he had eaten a morsel out of his
+satchel, and drunk of the water out of the stream.  There as he lay,
+if he had any doubt of peril, his weariness soon made it all one to
+him, for presently he was sleeping as soundly as any man in Langton
+on Holm.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII:  WALTER WENDS THE WASTE
+
+
+
+Day was yet young when he awoke:  he leapt to his feet, and went
+down to the stream and drank of its waters, and washed the night off
+him in a pool thereof, and then set forth on his way again.  When he
+had gone some three hours, the road, which had been going up all the
+way, but somewhat gently, grew steeper, and the bent on either side
+lowered, and lowered, till it sank at last altogether, and then was
+he on a rough mountain-neck with little grass, and no water; save
+that now and again was a soft place with a flow amidst of it, and
+such places he must needs fetch a compass about, lest he be mired.
+He gave himself but little rest, eating what he needs must as he
+went.  The day was bright and calm, so that the sun was never
+hidden, and he steered by it due south.  All that day he went, and
+found no more change in that huge neck, save that whiles it was more
+and whiles less steep.  A little before nightfall he happened on a
+shallow pool some twenty yards over; and he deemed it good to rest
+there, since there was water for his avail, though he might have
+made somewhat more out of the tail end of the day.
+
+When dawn came again he awoke and arose, nor spent much time over
+his breakfast; but pressed on all he might; and now he said to
+himself, that whatsoever other peril were athwart his way, he was
+out of the danger of the chase of his own folk.
+
+All this while he had seen no four-footed beast, save now and again
+a hill-fox, and once some outlandish kind of hare; and of fowl but
+very few:  a crow or two, a long-winged hawk, and twice an eagle
+high up aloft.
+
+Again, the third night, he slept in the stony wilderness, which
+still led him up and up.  Only toward the end of the day, himseemed
+that it had been less steep for a long while:  otherwise nought was
+changed, on all sides it was nought but the endless neck, wherefrom
+nought could be seen, but some other part of itself.  This fourth
+night withal he found no water whereby he might rest, so that he
+awoke parched, and longing to drink just when the dawn was at its
+coldest.
+
+But on the fifth morrow the ground rose but little, and at last,
+when he had been going wearily a long while, and now, hard on
+noontide, his thirst grieved him sorely, he came on a spring welling
+out from under a high rock, the water wherefrom trickled feebly
+away.  So eager was he to drink, that at first he heeded nought
+else; but when his thirst was fully quenched his eyes caught sight
+of the stream which flowed from the well, and he gave a shout, for
+lo! it was running south.  Wherefore it was with a merry heart that
+he went on, and as he went, came on more streams, all running south
+or thereabouts.  He hastened on all he might, but in despite of all
+the speed he made, and that he felt the land now going down
+southward, night overtook him in that same wilderness.  Yet when he
+stayed at last for sheer weariness, he lay down in what he deemed by
+the moonlight to be a shallow valley, with a ridge at the southern
+end thereof.
+
+He slept long, and when he awoke the sun was high in the heavens,
+and never was brighter or clearer morning on the earth than was
+that.  He arose and ate of what little was yet left him, and drank
+of the water of a stream which he had followed the evening before,
+and beside which he had laid him down; and then set forth again with
+no great hope to come on new tidings that day.  But yet when he was
+fairly afoot, himseemed that there was something new in the air
+which he breathed, that was soft and bore sweet scents home to him;
+whereas heretofore, and that especially for the last three or four
+days, it had been harsh and void, like the face of the desert
+itself.
+
+So on he went, and presently was mounting the ridge aforesaid, and,
+as oft happens when one climbs a steep place, he kept his eyes on
+the ground, till he felt he was on the top of the ridge.  Then he
+stopped to take breath, and raised his head and looked, and lo! he
+was verily on the brow of the great mountain-neck, and down below
+him was the hanging of the great hill-slopes, which fell down, not
+slowly, as those he had been those days a-mounting, but speedily
+enough, though with little of broken places or sheer cliffs.  But
+beyond this last of the desert there was before him a lovely land of
+wooded hills, green plains, and little valleys, stretching out far
+and wide, till it ended at last in great blue mountains and white
+snowy peaks beyond them.
+
+Then for very surprise of joy his spirit wavered, and he felt faint
+and dizzy, so that he was fain to sit down a while and cover his
+face with his hands.  Presently he came to his sober mind again, and
+stood up and looked forth keenly, and saw no sign of any dwelling of
+man.  But he said to himself that that might well be because the
+good and well-grassed land was still so far off, and that he might
+yet look to find men and their dwellings when he had left the
+mountain wilderness quite behind him:  So therewith he fell to going
+his ways down the mountain, and lost little time therein, whereas he
+now had his livelihood to look to.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX:  WALTER HAPPENETH ON THE FIRST OF THOSE THREE CREATURES
+
+
+
+What with one thing, what with another, as his having to turn out of
+his way for sheer rocks, or for slopes so steep that he might not
+try the peril of them, and again for bogs impassable, he was fully
+three days more before he had quite come out of the stony waste, and
+by that time, though he had never lacked water, his scanty victual
+was quite done, for all his careful husbandry thereof.  But this
+troubled him little, whereas he looked to find wild fruits here and
+there and to shoot some small deer, as hare or coney, and make a
+shift to cook the same, since he had with him flint and fire-steel.
+Moreover the further he went, the surer he was that he should soon
+come across a dwelling, so smooth and fair as everything looked
+before him.  And he had scant fear, save that he might happen on men
+who should enthrall him.
+
+But when he was come down past the first green slopes, he was so
+worn, that he said to himself that rest was better than meat, so
+little as he had slept for the last three days; so he laid him down
+under an ash-tree by a stream-side, nor asked what was o'clock, but
+had his fill of sleep, and even when he awoke in the fresh morning
+was little fain of rising, but lay betwixt sleeping and waking for
+some three hours more; then he arose, and went further down the next
+green bent, yet somewhat slowly because of his hunger-weakness.  And
+the scent of that fair land came up to him like the odour of one
+great nosegay.
+
+So he came to where the land was level, and there were many trees,
+as oak and ash, and sweet-chestnut and wych-elm, and hornbeam and
+quicken-tree, not growing in a close wood or tangled thicket, but
+set as though in order on the flowery greensward, even as it might
+be in a great king's park.
+
+So came he to a big bird-cherry, whereof many boughs hung low down
+laden with fruit:  his belly rejoiced at the sight, and he caught
+hold of a bough, and fell to plucking and eating.  But whiles he was
+amidst of this, he heard suddenly, close anigh him, a strange noise
+of roaring and braying, not very great, but exceeding fierce and
+terrible, and not like to the voice of any beast that he knew.  As
+has been aforesaid, Walter was no faint-heart; but what with the
+weakness of his travail and hunger, what with the strangeness of his
+adventure and his loneliness, his spirit failed him; he turned round
+towards the noise, his knees shook and he trembled:  this way and
+that he looked, and then gave a great cry and tumbled down in a
+swoon; for close before him, at his very feet, was the dwarf whose
+image he had seen before, clad in his yellow coat, and grinning up
+at him from his hideous hairy countenance.
+
+How long he lay there as one dead, he knew not, but when he woke
+again there was the dwarf sitting on his hams close by him.  And
+when he lifted up his head, the dwarf sent out that fearful harsh
+voice again; but this time Walter could make out words therein, and
+knew that the creature spoke and said:
+
+"How now!  What art thou?  Whence comest?  What wantest?"
+
+Walter sat up and said:  "I am a man; I hight Golden Walter; I come
+from Langton; I want victual."
+
+Said the dwarf, writhing his face grievously, and laughing forsooth:
+"I know it all:  I asked thee to see what wise thou wouldst lie.  I
+was sent forth to look for thee; and I have brought thee loathsome
+bread with me, such as ye aliens must needs eat:  take it!"
+
+Therewith he drew a loaf from a satchel which he bore, and thrust it
+towards Walter, who took it somewhat doubtfully for all his hunger.
+
+The dwarf yelled at him:  "Art thou dainty, alien?  Wouldst thou
+have flesh?  Well, give me thy bow and an arrow or two, since thou
+art lazy-sick, and I will get thee a coney or a hare, or a quail
+maybe.  Ah, I forgot; thou art dainty, and wilt not eat flesh as I
+do, blood and all together, but must needs half burn it in the fire,
+or mar it with hot water; as they say my Lady does:  or as the
+Wretch, the Thing does; I know that, for I have seen It eating."
+
+"Nay," said Walter, "this sufficeth;" and he fell to eating the
+bread, which was sweet between his teeth.  Then when he had eaten a
+while, for hunger compelled him, he said to the dwarf:  "But what
+meanest thou by the Wretch and the Thing?  And what Lady is thy
+Lady?"
+
+The creature let out another wordless roar as of furious anger; and
+then the words came:  "It hath a face white and red, like to thine;
+and hands white as thine, yea, but whiter; and the like it is
+underneath its raiment, only whiter still:  for I have seen It--yes,
+I have seen It; ah yes and yes and yes."
+
+And therewith his words ran into gibber and yelling, and he rolled
+about and smote at the grass:  but in a while he grew quiet again
+and sat still, and then fell to laughing horribly again, and then
+said:  "But thou, fool, wilt think It fair if thou fallest into Its
+hands, and wilt repent it thereafter, as I did.  Oh, the mocking and
+gibes of It, and the tears and shrieks of It; and the knife!  What!
+sayest thou of my Lady?--What Lady?  O alien, what other Lady is
+there?  And what shall I tell thee of her? it is like that she made
+me, as she made the Bear men.  But she made not the Wretch, the
+Thing; and she hateth It sorely, as I do.  And some day to come--"
+
+Thereat he brake off and fell to wordless yelling a long while, and
+thereafter spake all panting:  "Now I have told thee overmuch, and O
+if my Lady come to hear thereof.  Now I will go."
+
+And therewith he took out two more loaves from his wallet, and
+tossed them to Walter, and so turned and went his ways; whiles
+walking upright, as Walter had seen his image on the quay of
+Langton; whiles bounding and rolling like a ball thrown by a lad;
+whiles scuttling along on all-fours like an evil beast, and ever and
+anon giving forth that harsh and evil cry.
+
+Walter sat a while after he was out of sight, so stricken with
+horror and loathing and a fear of he knew not what, that he might
+not move.  Then he plucked up a heart, and looked to his weapons and
+put the other loaves into his scrip.
+
+Then he arose and went his ways wondering, yea and dreading, what
+kind of creature he should next fall in with.  For soothly it seemed
+to him that it would be worse than death if they were all such as
+this one; and that if it were so, he must needs slay and be slain.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X:  WALTER HAPPENETH ON ANOTHER CREATURE IN THE STRANGE LAND
+
+
+
+But as he went on through the fair and sweet land so bright and sun-
+litten, and he now rested and fed, the horror and fear ran off from
+him, and he wandered on merrily, neither did aught befall him save
+the coming of night, when he laid him down under a great spreading
+oak with his drawn sword ready to hand, and fell asleep at once, and
+woke not till the sun was high.
+
+Then he arose and went on his way again; and the land was no worser
+than yesterday; but even better, it might be; the greensward more
+flowery, the oaks and chestnuts greater.  Deer of diverse kinds he
+saw, and might easily have got his meat thereof; but he meddled not
+with them since he had his bread, and was timorous of lighting a
+fire.  Withal he doubted little of having some entertainment; and
+that, might be, nought evil; since even that fearful dwarf had been
+courteous to him after his kind, and had done him good and not harm.
+But of the happening on the Wretch and the Thing, whereof the dwarf
+spake, he was yet somewhat afeard.
+
+After he had gone a while and whenas the summer morn was at its
+brightest, he saw a little way ahead a grey rock rising up from
+amidst of a ring of oak-trees; so he turned thither straightway; for
+in this plain-land he had seen no rocks heretofore; and as he went
+he saw that there was a fountain gushing out from under the rock,
+which ran thence in a fair little stream.  And when he had the rock
+and the fountain and the stream clear before him, lo! a child of
+Adam sitting beside the fountain under the shadow of the rock.  He
+drew a little nigher, and then he saw that it was a woman, clad in
+green like the sward whereon she lay.  She was playing with the
+welling out of the water, and she had trussed up her sleeves to the
+shoulder that she might thrust her bare arms therein.  Her shoes of
+black leather lay on the grass beside her, and her feet and legs yet
+shone with the brook.
+
+Belike amidst the splashing and clatter of the water she did not
+hear him drawing nigh, so that he was close to her before she lifted
+up her face and saw him, and he beheld her, that it was the maiden
+of the thrice-seen pageant.  She reddened when she saw him, and
+hastily covered up her legs with her gown-skirt, and drew down the
+sleeves over her arms, but otherwise stirred not.  As for him, he
+stood still, striving to speak to her; but no word might he bring
+out, and his heart beat sorely.
+
+But the maiden spake to him in a clear sweet voice, wherein was now
+no trouble:  "Thou art an alien, art thou not?  For I have not seen
+thee before."
+
+"Yea," he said, "I am an alien; wilt thou be good to me?"
+
+She said:  "And why not?  I was afraid at first, for I thought it
+had been the King's Son.  I looked to see none other; for of goodly
+men he has been the only one here in the land this long while, till
+thy coming."
+
+He said:  "Didst thou look for my coming at about this time?"
+
+"O nay," she said; "how might I?"
+
+Said Walter:  "I wot not; but the other man seemed to be looking for
+me, and knew of me, and he brought me bread to eat."
+
+She looked on him anxiously, and grew somewhat pale, as she said:
+"What other one?"
+
+Now Walter did not know what the dwarf might be to her, fellow-
+servant or what not, so he would not show his loathing of him; but
+answered wisely:  "The little man in the yellow raiment."
+
+But when she heard that word, she went suddenly very pale, and
+leaned her head aback, and beat the air with her hands; but said
+presently in a faint voice:  "I pray thee talk not of that one while
+I am by, nor even think of him, if thou mayest forbear."
+
+He spake not, and she was a little while before she came to herself
+again; then she opened her eyes, and looked upon Walter and smiled
+kindly on him, as though to ask his pardon for having scared him.
+Then she rose up in her place, and stood before him; and they were
+nigh together, for the stream betwixt them was little.
+
+But he still looked anxiously upon her and said:  "Have I hurt thee?
+I pray thy pardon."
+
+She looked on him more sweetly still, and said:  "O nay; thou
+wouldst not hurt me, thou!"
+
+Then she blushed very red, and he in like wise; but afterwards she
+turned pale, and laid a hand on her breast, and Walter cried out
+hastily:  "O me!  I have hurt thee again.  Wherein have I done
+amiss?"
+
+"In nought, in nought," she said; "but I am troubled, I wot not
+wherefore; some thought hath taken hold of me, and I know it not.
+Mayhappen in a little while I shall know what troubles me.  Now I
+bid thee depart from me a little, and I will abide here; and when
+thou comest back, it will either be that I have found it out or not;
+and in either case I will tell thee."
+
+She spoke earnestly to him; but he said:  "How long shall I abide
+away?"
+
+Her face was troubled as she answered him:  "For no long while."
+
+He smiled on her and turned away, and went a space to the other side
+of the oak-trees, whence she was still within eyeshot.  There he
+abode until the time seemed long to him; but he schooled himself and
+forbore; for he said:  Lest she send me away again.  So he abided
+until again the time seemed long to him, and she called not to him:
+but once again he forbore to go; then at last he arose, and his
+heart beat and he trembled, and he walked back again speedily, and
+came to the maiden, who was still standing by the rock of the
+spring, her arms hanging down, her eyes downcast.  She looked up at
+him as he drew nigh, and her face changed with eagerness as she
+said:  "I am glad thou art come back, though it be no long while
+since thy departure" (sooth to say it was scarce half an hour in
+all).  "Nevertheless I have been thinking many things, and thereof
+will I now tell thee."
+
+He said:  "Maiden, there is a river betwixt us, though it be no big
+one.  Shall I not stride over, and come to thee, that we may sit
+down together side by side on the green grass?"
+
+"Nay," she said, "not yet; tarry a while till I have told thee of
+matters.  I must now tell thee of my thoughts in order."
+
+Her colour went and came now, and she plaited the folds of her gown
+with restless fingers.  At last she said:  "Now the first thing is
+this; that though thou hast seen me first only within this hour,
+thou hast set thine heart upon me to have me for thy speech-friend
+and thy darling.  And if this be not so, then is all my speech, yea
+and all my hope, come to an end at once."
+
+"O yea!" said Walter, "even so it is:  but how thou hast found this
+out I wot not; since now for the first time I say it, that thou art
+indeed my love, and my dear and my darling."
+
+"Hush," she said, "hush! lest the wood have ears, and thy speech is
+loud:  abide, and I shall tell thee how I know it.  Whether this thy
+love shall outlast the first time that thou holdest my body in thine
+arms, I wot not, nor dost thou.  But sore is my hope that it may be
+so; for I also, though it be but scarce an hour since I set eyes on
+thee, have cast mine eyes on thee to have thee for my love and my
+darling, and my speech-friend.  And this is how I wot that thou
+lovest me, my friend.  Now is all this dear and joyful, and
+overflows my heart with sweetness.  But now must I tell thee of the
+fear and the evil which lieth behind it."
+
+Then Walter stretched out his hands to her, and cried out:  "Yea,
+yea!  But whatever evil entangle us, now we both know these two
+things, to wit, that thou lovest me, and I thee, wilt thou not come
+hither, that I may cast mine arms about thee, and kiss thee, if not
+thy kind lips or thy friendly face at all, yet at least thy dear
+hand:  yea, that I may touch thy body in some wise?"
+
+She looked on him steadily, and said softly:  "Nay, this above all
+things must not be; and that it may not be is a part of the evil
+which entangles us.  But hearken, friend, once again I tell thee
+that thy voice is over loud in this wilderness fruitful of evil.
+Now I have told thee, indeed, of two things whereof we both wot; but
+next I must needs tell thee of things whereof I wot, and thou
+wottest not.  Yet this were better, that thou pledge thy word not to
+touch so much as one of my hands, and that we go together a little
+way hence away from these tumbled stones, and sit down upon the open
+greensward; whereas here is cover if there be spying abroad."
+
+Again, as she spoke, she turned very pale; but Walter said:  "Since
+it must be so, I pledge thee my word to thee as I love thee."
+
+And therewith she knelt down, and did on her foot-gear, and then
+sprang lightly over the rivulet; and then the twain of them went
+side by side some half a furlong thence, and sat down, shadowed by
+the boughs of a slim quicken-tree growing up out of the greensward,
+whereon for a good space around was neither bush nor brake.
+
+There began the maiden to talk soberly, and said:  "This is what I
+must needs say to thee now, that thou art come into a land perilous
+for any one that loveth aught of good; from which, forsooth, I were
+fain that thou wert gotten away safely, even though I should die of
+longing for thee.  As for myself, my peril is, in a measure, less
+than thine; I mean the peril of death.  But lo, thou, this iron on
+my foot is token that I am a thrall, and thou knowest in what wise
+thralls must pay for transgressions.  Furthermore, of what I am, and
+how I came hither, time would fail me to tell; but somewhile, maybe,
+I shall tell thee.  I serve an evil mistress, of whom I may say that
+scarce I wot if she be a woman or not; but by some creatures is she
+accounted for a god, and as a god is heried; and surely never god
+was crueller nor colder than she.  Me she hateth sorely; yet if she
+hated me little or nought, small were the gain to me if it were her
+pleasure to deal hardly by me.  But as things now are, and are like
+to be, it would not be for her pleasure, but for her pain and loss,
+to make an end of me, therefore, as I said e'en now, my mere life is
+not in peril with her; unless, perchance, some sudden passion get
+the better of her, and she slay me, and repent of it thereafter.
+For so it is, that if it be the least evil of her conditions that
+she is wanton, at least wanton she is to the letter.  Many a time
+hath she cast the net for the catching of some goodly young man; and
+her latest prey (save it be thou) is the young man whom I named,
+when first I saw thee, by the name of the King's Son.  He is with us
+yet, and I fear him; for of late hath he wearied of her, though it
+is but plain truth to say of her, that she is the wonder of all
+Beauties of the World.  He hath wearied of her, I say, and hath cast
+his eyes upon me, and if I were heedless, he would betray me to the
+uttermost of the wrath of my mistress.  For needs must I say of him,
+though he be a goodly man, and now fallen into thralldom, that he
+hath no bowels of compassion; but is a dastard, who for an hour's
+pleasure would undo me, and thereafter would stand by smiling and
+taking my mistress's pardon with good cheer, while for me would be
+no pardon.  Seest thou, therefore, how it is with me between these
+two cruel fools?  And moreover there are others of whom I will not
+even speak to thee."
+
+And therewith she put her hands before her face, and wept, and
+murmured:  "Who shall deliver me from this death in life?"
+
+But Walter cried out:  "For what else am I come hither, I, I?"
+
+And it was a near thing that he did not take her in his arms, but he
+remembered his pledged word, and drew aback from her in terror,
+whereas he had an inkling of why she would not suffer it; and he
+wept with her.
+
+But suddenly the Maid left weeping, and said in a changed voice:
+"Friend, whereas thou speakest of delivering me, it is more like
+that I shall deliver thee.  And now I pray thy pardon for thus
+grieving thee with my grief, and that more especially because thou
+mayst not solace thy grief with kisses and caresses; but so it was,
+that for once I was smitten by the thought of the anguish of this
+land, and the joy of all the world besides."
+
+Therewith she caught her breath in a half-sob, but refrained her and
+went on:  "Now dear friend and darling, take good heed to all that I
+shall say to thee, whereas thou must do after the teaching of my
+words.  And first, I deem by the monster having met thee at the
+gates of the land, and refreshed thee, that the Mistress hath looked
+for thy coming; nay, by thy coming hither at all, that she hath cast
+her net and caught thee.  Hast thou noted aught that might seem to
+make this more like?"
+
+Said Walter:  "Three times in full daylight have I seen go past me
+the images of the monster and thee and a glorious lady, even as if
+ye were alive."
+
+And therewith he told her in few words how it had gone with him
+since that day on the quay at Langton.
+
+She said:  "Then it is no longer perhaps, but certain, that thou art
+her latest catch; and even so I deemed from the first:  and, dear
+friend, this is why I have not suffered thee to kiss or caress me,
+so sore as I longed for thee.  For the Mistress will have thee for
+her only, and hath lured thee hither for nought else; and she is
+wise in wizardry (even as some deal am I), and wert thou to touch me
+with hand or mouth on my naked flesh, yea, or were it even my
+raiment, then would she scent the savour of thy love upon me, and
+then, though it may be she would spare thee, she would not spare
+me."
+
+Then was she silent a little, and seemed very downcast, and Walter
+held his peace from grief and confusion and helplessness; for of
+wizardry he knew nought.
+
+At last the Maid spake again, and said:  "Nevertheless we will not
+die redeless.  Now thou must look to this, that from henceforward it
+is thee, and not the King's Son, whom she desireth, and that so much
+the more that she hath not set eyes on thee.  Remember this,
+whatsoever her seeming may be to thee.  Now, therefore, shall the
+King's Son be free, though he know it not, to cast his love on
+whomso he will; and, in a way, I also shall be free to yeasay him.
+Though, forsooth, so fulfilled is she with malice and spite, that
+even then she may turn round on me to punish me for doing that which
+she would have me do.  Now let me think of it."
+
+Then was she silent a good while, and spoke at last:  "Yea, all
+things are perilous, and a perilous rede I have thought of, whereof
+I will not tell thee as yet; so waste not the short while by asking
+me.  At least the worst will be no worse than what shall come if we
+strive not against it.  And now, my friend, amongst perils it is
+growing more and more perilous that we twain should be longer
+together.  But I would say one thing yet; and maybe another
+thereafter.  Thou hast cast thy love upon one who will be true to
+thee, whatsoever may befall; yet is she a guileful creature, and
+might not help it her life long, and now for thy very sake must
+needs be more guileful now than ever before.  And as for me, the
+guileful, my love have I cast upon a lovely man, and one true and
+simple, and a stout-heart; but at such a pinch is he, that if he
+withstand all temptation, his withstanding may belike undo both him
+and me.  Therefore swear we both of us, that by both of us shall all
+guile and all falling away be forgiven on the day when we shall be
+free to love each the other as our hearts will."
+
+Walter cried out:  "O love, I swear it indeed! thou art my Hallow,
+and I will swear it as on the relics of a Hallow; on thy hands and
+thy feet I swear it."
+
+The words seemed to her a dear caress; and she laughed, and blushed,
+and looked full kindly on him; and then her face grew solemn, and
+she said:  "On thy life I swear it!"
+
+Then she said:  "Now is there nought for thee to do but to go hence
+straight to the Golden House, which is my Mistress's house, and the
+only house in this land (save one which I may not see), and lieth
+southward no long way.  How she will deal with thee, I wot not; but
+all I have said of her and thee and the King's Son is true.
+Therefore I say to thee, be wary and cold at heart, whatsoever
+outward semblance thou mayst make.  If thou have to yield thee to
+her, then yield rather late than early, so as to gain time.  Yet not
+so late as to seem shamed in yielding for fear's sake.  Hold fast to
+thy life, my friend, for in warding that, thou wardest me from grief
+without remedy.  Thou wilt see me ere long; it may be to-morrow, it
+may be some days hence.  But forget not, that what I may do, that I
+am doing.  Take heed also that thou pay no more heed to me, or
+rather less, than if thou wert meeting a maiden of no account in the
+streets of thine own town.  O my love! barren is this first
+farewell, as was our first meeting; but surely shall there be
+another meeting better than the first, and the last farewell may be
+long and long yet."
+
+Therewith she stood up, and he knelt before her a little while
+without any word, and then arose and went his ways; but when he had
+gone a space he turned about, and saw her still standing in the same
+place; she stayed a moment when she saw him turn, and then herself
+turned about.
+
+So he departed through the fair land, and his heart was full with
+hope and fear as he went.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI:  WALTER HAPPENETH ON THE MISTRESS
+
+
+
+It was but a little after noon when Walter left the Maid behind:  he
+steered south by the sun, as the Maid had bidden him, and went
+swiftly; for, as a good knight wending to battle, the time seemed
+long to him till he should meet the foe.
+
+So an hour before sunset he saw something white and gay gleaming
+through the boles of the oak-trees, and presently there was clear
+before him a most goodly house builded of white marble, carved all
+about with knots and imagery, and the carven folk were all painted
+of their lively colours, whether it were their raiment or their
+flesh, and the housings wherein they stood all done with gold and
+fair hues.  Gay were the windows of the house; and there was a
+pillared porch before the great door, with images betwixt the
+pillars both of men and beasts:  and when Walter looked up to the
+roof of the house, he saw that it gleamed and shone; for all the
+tiles were of yellow metal, which he deemed to be of very gold.
+
+All this he saw as he went, and tarried not to gaze upon it; for he
+said, Belike there will be time for me to look on all this before I
+die.  But he said also, that, though the house was not of the
+greatest, it was beyond compare of all houses of the world.
+
+Now he entered it by the porch, and came into a hall many-pillared,
+and vaulted over, the walls painted with gold and ultramarine, the
+floor dark, and spangled with many colours, and the windows glazed
+with knots and pictures.  Midmost thereof was a fountain of gold,
+whence the water ran two ways in gold-lined runnels, spanned twice
+with little bridges of silver.  Long was that hall, and now not very
+light, so that Walter was come past the fountain before he saw any
+folk therein:  then he looked up toward the high-seat, and himseemed
+that a great light shone thence, and dazzled his eyes; and he went
+on a little way, and then fell on his knees; for there before him on
+the high-seat sat that wondrous Lady, whose lively image had been
+shown to him thrice before; and she was clad in gold and jewels, as
+he had erst seen her.  But now she was not alone; for by her side
+sat a young man, goodly enough, so far as Walter might see him, and
+most richly clad, with a jewelled sword by his side, and a chaplet
+of gems on his head.  They held each other by the hand, and seemed
+to be in dear converse together; but they spake softly, so that
+Walter might not hear what they said, till at last the man spake
+aloud to the Lady:  "Seest thou not that there is a man in the
+hall?"
+
+"Yea," she said, "I see him yonder, kneeling on his knees; let him
+come nigher and give some account of himself."
+
+So Walter stood up and drew nigh, and stood there, all shamefaced
+and confused, looking on those twain, and wondering at the beauty of
+the Lady.  As for the man, who was slim, and black-haired, and
+straight-featured, for all his goodliness Walter accounted him
+little, and nowise deemed him to look chieftain-like.
+
+Now the Lady spake not to Walter any more than erst; but at last the
+man said:  "Why doest thou not kneel as thou didst erewhile?"
+
+Walter was on the point of giving him back a fierce answer; but the
+Lady spake and said:  "Nay, friend, it matters not whether he kneel
+or stand; but he may say, if he will, what he would have of me, and
+wherefore he is come hither."
+
+Then spake Walter, for as wroth and ashamed as he was:  "Lady, I
+have strayed into this land, and have come to thine house as I
+suppose, and if I be not welcome, I may well depart straightway, and
+seek a way out of thy land, if thou wouldst drive me thence, as well
+as out of thine house."
+
+Thereat the Lady turned and looked on him, and when her eyes met
+his, he felt a pang of fear and desire mingled shoot through his
+heart.  This time she spoke to him; but coldly, without either wrath
+or any thought of him:  "Newcomer," she said, "I have not bidden
+thee hither; but here mayst thou abide a while if thou wilt;
+nevertheless, take heed that here is no King's Court.  There is,
+forsooth, a folk that serveth me (or, it may be, more than one), of
+whom thou wert best to know nought.  Of others I have but two
+servants, whom thou wilt see; and the one is a strange creature, who
+should scare thee or scathe thee with a good will, but of a good
+will shall serve nought save me; the other is a woman, a thrall, of
+little avail, save that, being compelled, she will work woman's
+service for me, but whom none else shall compel . . . Yea, but what
+is all this to thee; or to me that I should tell it to thee?  I will
+not drive thee away; but if thine entertainment please thee not,
+make no plaint thereof to me, but depart at thy will.  Now is this
+talk betwixt us overlong, since, as thou seest, I and this King's
+Son are in converse together.  Art thou a King's Son?"
+
+"Nay, Lady," said Walter, "I am but of the sons of the merchants."
+
+"It matters not," she said; "go thy ways into one of the chambers."
+
+And straightway she fell a-talking to the man who sat beside her
+concerning the singing of the birds beneath her window in the
+morning; and of how she had bathed her that day in a pool of the
+woodlands, when she had been heated with hunting, and so forth; and
+all as if there had been none there save her and the King's Son.
+
+But Walter departed all ashamed, as though he had been a poor man
+thrust away from a rich kinsman's door; and he said to himself that
+this woman was hateful, and nought love-worthy, and that she was
+little like to tempt him, despite all the fairness of her body.
+
+No one else he saw in the house that even; he found meat and drink
+duly served on a fair table, and thereafter he came on a goodly bed,
+and all things needful, but no child of Adam to do him service, or
+bid him welcome or warning.  Nevertheless he ate, and drank, and
+slept, and put off thought of all these things till the morrow, all
+the more as he hoped to see the kind maiden some time betwixt
+sunrise and sunset on that new day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII:  THE WEARING OF FOUR DAYS IN THE WOOD BEYOND THE WORLD
+
+
+
+He arose betimes, but found no one to greet him, neither was there
+any sound of folk moving within the fair house; so he but broke his
+fast, and then went forth and wandered amongst the trees, till he
+found him a stream to bathe in, and after he had washed the night
+off him he lay down under a tree thereby for a while, but soon
+turned back toward the house, lest perchance the Maid should come
+thither and he should miss her.
+
+It should be said that half a bow-shot from the house on that side
+(i.e. due north thereof) was a little hazel-brake, and round about
+it the trees were smaller of kind than the oaks and chestnuts he had
+passed through before, being mostly of birch and quicken-beam and
+young ash, with small wood betwixt them; so now he passed through
+the thicket, and, coming to the edge thereof, beheld the Lady and
+the King's Son walking together hand in hand, full lovingly by
+seeming.
+
+He deemed it unmeet to draw back and hide him, so he went forth past
+them toward the house.  The King's Son scowled on him as he passed,
+but the Lady, over whose beauteous face flickered the joyous morning
+smiles, took no more heed of him than if he had been one of the
+trees of the wood.  But she had been so high and disdainful with him
+the evening before, that he thought little of that.  The twain went
+on, skirting the hazel-copse, and he could not choose but turn his
+eyes on them, so sorely did the Lady's beauty draw them.  Then
+befell another thing; for behind them the boughs of the hazels
+parted, and there stood that little evil thing, he or another of his
+kind; for he was quite unclad, save by his fell of yellowy-brown
+hair, and that he was girt with a leathern girdle, wherein was stuck
+an ugly two-edged knife:  he stood upright a moment, and cast his
+eyes at Walter and grinned, but not as if he knew him; and scarce
+could Walter say whether it were the one he had seen, or another:
+then he cast himself down on his belly, and fell to creeping through
+the long grass like a serpent, following the footsteps of the Lady
+and her lover; and now, as he crept, Walter deemed, in his loathing,
+that the creature was liker to a ferret than aught else.  He crept
+on marvellous swiftly, and was soon clean out of sight.  But Walter
+stood staring after him for a while, and then lay down by the copse-
+side, that he might watch the house and the entry thereof; for he
+thought, now perchance presently will the kind maiden come hither to
+comfort me with a word or two.  But hour passed by hour, and still
+she came not; and still he lay there, and thought of the Maid, and
+longed for her kindness and wisdom, till he could not refrain his
+tears, and wept for the lack of her.  Then he arose, and went and
+sat in the porch, and was very downcast of mood.
+
+But as he sat there, back comes the Lady again, the King's Son
+leading her by the hand; they entered the porch, and she passed by
+him so close that the odour of her raiment filled all the air about
+him, and the sleekness of her side nigh touched him, so that he
+could not fail to note that her garments were somewhat disarrayed,
+and that she kept her right hand (for her left the King's Son held)
+to her bosom to hold the cloth together there, whereas the rich
+raiment had been torn off from her right shoulder.  As they passed
+by him, the King's Son once more scowled on him, wordless, but even
+more fiercely than before; and again the Lady heeded him nought.
+
+After they had gone on a while, he entered the hall, and found it
+empty from end to end, and no sound in it save the tinkling of the
+fountain; but there was victual set on the board.  He ate and drank
+thereof to keep life lusty within him, and then went out again to
+the wood-side to watch and to long; and the time hung heavy on his
+hands because of the lack of the fair Maiden.
+
+He was of mind not to go into the house to his rest that night, but
+to sleep under the boughs of the forest.  But a little after sunset
+he saw a bright-clad image moving amidst the carven images of the
+porch, and the King's Son came forth and went straight to him, and
+said:  "Thou art to enter the house, and go into thy chamber
+forthwith, and by no means to go forth of it betwixt sunset and
+sunrise.  My Lady will not away with thy prowling round the house in
+the night-tide."
+
+Therewith he turned away, and went into the house again; and Walter
+followed him soberly, remembering how the Maid had bidden him
+forbear.  So he went to his chamber, and slept.
+
+But amidst of the night he awoke and deemed that he heard a voice
+not far off, so he crept out of his bed and peered around, lest,
+perchance, the Maid had come to speak with him; but his chamber was
+dusk and empty:  then he went to the window and looked out, and saw
+the moon shining bright and white upon the greensward.  And lo! the
+Lady walking with the King's Son, and he clad in thin and wanton
+raiment, but she in nought else save what God had given her of long,
+crispy yellow hair.  Then was Walter ashamed to look on her, seeing
+that there was a man with her, and gat him back to his bed; but yet
+a long while ere he slept again he had the image before his eyes of
+the fair woman on the dewy moonlit grass.
+
+The next day matters went much the same way, and the next also, save
+that his sorrow was increased, and he sickened sorely of hope
+deferred.  On the fourth day also the forenoon wore as erst; but in
+the heat of the afternoon Walter sought to the hazel-copse, and laid
+him down there hard by a little clearing thereof, and slept from
+very weariness of grief.  There, after a while, he woke with words
+still hanging in his ears, and he knew at once that it was they
+twain talking together.
+
+The King's Son had just done his say, and now it was the Lady
+beginning in her honey-sweet voice, low but strong, wherein even was
+a little of huskiness; she said:  "Otto, belike it were well to have
+a little patience, till we find out what the man is, and whence he
+cometh; it will always be easy to rid us of him; it is but a word to
+our Dwarf-king, and it will be done in a few minutes."
+
+"Patience!" said the King's Son, angrily; "I wot not how to have
+patience with him; for I can see of him that he is rude and violent
+and headstrong, and a low-born wily one.  Forsooth, he had patience
+enough with me the other even, when I rated him in, like the dog
+that he is, and he had no manhood to say one word to me.  Soothly,
+as he followed after me, I had a mind to turn about and deal him a
+buffet on the face, to see if I could but draw one angry word from
+him."
+
+The Lady laughed, and said:  "Well, Otto, I know not; that which
+thou deemest dastardy in him may be but prudence and wisdom, and he
+an alien, far from his friends and nigh to his foes.  Perchance we
+shall yet try him what he is.  Meanwhile, I rede thee try him not
+with buffets, save he be weaponless and with bounden hands; or else
+I deem that but a little while shalt thou be fain of thy blow."
+
+Now when Walter heard her words and the voice wherein they were
+said, he might not forbear being stirred by them, and to him, all
+lonely there, they seemed friendly.
+
+But he lay still, and the King's Son answered the Lady and said:  "I
+know not what is in thine heart concerning this runagate, that thou
+shouldst bemock me with his valiancy, whereof thou knowest nought.
+If thou deem me unworthy of thee, send me back safe to my father's
+country; I may look to have worship there; yea, and the love of fair
+women belike."
+
+Therewith it seemed as if he had put forth his hand to the Lady to
+caress her, for she said:  "Nay, lay not thine hand on my shoulder,
+for to-day and now it is not the hand of love, but of pride and
+folly, and would-be mastery.  Nay, neither shalt thou rise up and
+leave me until thy mood is softer and kinder to me."
+
+Then was there silence betwixt them a while, and thereafter the
+King's Son spake in a wheedling voice:  "My goddess, I pray thee
+pardon me!  But canst thou wonder that I fear thy wearying of me,
+and am therefore peevish and jealous? thou so far above the Queens
+of the World, and I a poor youth that without thee were nothing!"
+
+She answered nought, and he went on again:  "Was it not so, O
+goddess, that this man of the sons of the merchants was little
+heedful of thee, and thy loveliness and thy majesty?"
+
+She laughed and said:  "Maybe he deemed not that he had much to gain
+of us, seeing thee sitting by our side, and whereas we spake to him
+coldly and sternly and disdainfully.  Withal, the poor youth was
+dazzled and shamefaced before us; that we could see in the eyes and
+the mien of him."
+
+Now this she spoke so kindly and sweetly, that again was Walter all
+stirred thereat; and it came into his mind that it might be she knew
+he was anigh and hearing her, and that she spake as much for him as
+for the King's Son:  but that one answered:  "Lady, didst thou not
+see somewhat else in his eyes, to wit, that they had but of late
+looked on some fair woman other than thee?  As for me, I deem it not
+so unlike that on the way to thine hall he may have fallen in with
+thy Maid."
+
+He spoke in a faltering voice, as if shrinking from some storm that
+might come.  And forsooth the Lady's voice was changed as she
+answered, though there was no outward heat in it; rather it was
+sharp and eager and cold at once.  She said:  "Yea, that is not ill
+thought of; but we may not always keep our thrall in mind.  If it be
+so as thou deemest, we shall come to know it most like when we next
+fall in with her; or if she hath been shy this time, then shall she
+pay the heavier for it; for we will question her by the Fountain in
+the Hall as to what betid by the Fountain of the Rock."
+
+Spake the King's Son, faltering yet more:  "Lady, were it not better
+to question the man himself? the Maid is stout-hearted, and will not
+be speedily quelled into a true tale; whereas the man I deem of no
+account."
+
+"No, no," said the Lady sharply, "it shall not be."
+
+Then was she silent a while; and then she said:  "How if the man
+should prove to be our master?"
+
+"Nay, our Lady," said the King's Son, "thou art jesting with me;
+thou and thy might and thy wisdom, and all that thy wisdom may
+command, to be over-mastered by a gangrel churl!"
+
+"But how if I will not have it command, King's Son?" said the Lady.
+"I tell thee I know thine heart, but thou knowest not mine.  But be
+at peace!  For since thou hast prayed for this woman--nay, not with
+thy words, I wot, but with thy trembling hands, and thine anxious
+eyes, and knitted brow--I say, since thou hast prayed for her so
+earnestly, she shall escape this time.  But whether it will be to
+her gain in the long run, I misdoubt me.  See thou to that, Otto!
+thou who hast held me in thine arms so oft.  And now thou mayest
+depart if thou wilt."
+
+It seemed to Walter as if the King's Son were dumbfoundered at her
+words:  he answered nought, and presently he rose from the ground,
+and went his ways slowly toward the house.  The Lady lay there a
+little while, and then went her ways also; but turned away from the
+house toward the wood at the other end thereof, whereby Walter had
+first come thither.
+
+As for Walter, he was confused in mind and shaken in spirit; and
+withal he seemed to see guile and cruel deeds under the talk of
+those two, and waxed wrathful thereat.  Yet he said to himself, that
+nought might he do, but was as one bound hand and foot, till he had
+seen the Maid again.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII:  NOW IS THE HUNT UP
+
+
+
+Next morning was he up betimes, but he was cast down and heavy of
+heart, not looking for aught else to betide than had betid those
+last four days.  But otherwise it fell out; for when he came down
+into the hall, there was the lady sitting on the high-seat all
+alone, clad but in a coat of white linen; and she turned her head
+when she heard his footsteps, and looked on him, and greeted him,
+and said:  "Come hither, guest."
+
+So he went and stood before her, and she said:  "Though as yet thou
+hast had no welcome here, and no honour, it hath not entered into
+thine heart to flee from us; and to say sooth, that is well for
+thee, for flee away from our hand thou mightest not, nor mightest
+thou depart without our furtherance.  But for this we can thee
+thank, that thou hast abided here our bidding and eaten thine heart
+through the heavy wearing of four days, and made no plaint.  Yet I
+cannot deem thee a dastard; thou so well knit and shapely of body,
+so clear-eyed and bold of visage.  Wherefore now I ask thee, art
+thou willing to do me service, thereby to earn thy guesting?"
+
+Walter answered her, somewhat faltering at first, for he was
+astonished at the change which had come over her; for now she spoke
+to him in friendly wise, though indeed as a great lady would speak
+to a young man ready to serve her in all honour.  Said he:  "Lady, I
+can thank thee humbly and heartily in that thou biddest me do thee
+service; for these days past I have loathed the emptiness of the
+hours, and nought better could I ask for than to serve so glorious a
+Mistress in all honour."
+
+She frowned somewhat, and said:  "Thou shalt not call me Mistress;
+there is but one who so calleth me, that is my thrall; and thou art
+none such.  Thou shalt call me Lady, and I shall be well pleased
+that thou be my squire, and for this present thou shalt serve me in
+the hunting.  So get thy gear; take thy bow and arrows, and gird
+thee to thy sword.  For in this fair land may one find beasts more
+perilous than be buck or hart.  I go now to array me; we will depart
+while the day is yet young; for so make we the summer day the
+fairest."
+
+He made obeisance to her, and she arose and went to her chamber, and
+Walter dight himself, and then abode her in the porch; and in less
+than an hour she came out of the hall, and Walter's heart beat when
+he saw that the Maid followed her hard at heel, and scarce might he
+school his eyes not to gaze over-eagerly at his dear friend.  She
+was clad even as she was before, and was changed in no wise, save
+that love troubled her face when she first beheld him, and she had
+much ado to master it:  howbeit the Mistress heeded not the trouble
+of her, or made no semblance of heeding it, till the Maiden's face
+was all according to its wont.
+
+But this Walter found strange, that after all that disdain of the
+Maid's thralldom which he had heard of the Mistress, and after all
+the threats against her, now was the Mistress become mild and
+debonaire to her, as a good lady to her good maiden.  When Walter
+bowed the knee to her, she turned unto the Maid, and said:  "Look
+thou, my Maid, at this fair new Squire that I have gotten!  Will not
+he be valiant in the greenwood?  And see whether he be well shapen
+or not.  Doth he not touch thine heart, when thou thinkest of all
+the woe, and fear, and trouble of the World beyond the Wood, which
+he hath escaped, to dwell in this little land peaceably, and well-
+beloved both by the Mistress and the Maid?  And thou, my Squire,
+look a little at this fair slim Maiden, and say if she pleaseth thee
+not:  didst thou deem that we had any thing so fair in this lonely
+place?"
+
+Frank and kind was the smile on her radiant visage, nor did she seem
+to note any whit the trouble on Walter's face, nor how he strove to
+keep his eyes from the Maid.  As for her, she had so wholly mastered
+her countenance, that belike she used her face guilefully, for she
+stood as one humble but happy, with a smile on her face, blushing,
+and with her head hung down as if shamefaced before a goodly young
+man, a stranger.
+
+But the Lady looked upon her kindly and said:  "Come hither, child,
+and fear not this frank and free young man, who belike feareth thee
+a little, and full certainly feareth me; and yet only after the
+manner of men."
+
+And therewith she took the Maid by the hand and drew her to her, and
+pressed her to her bosom, and kissed her cheeks and her lips, and
+undid the lacing of her gown and bared a shoulder of her, and swept
+away her skirt from her feet; and then turned to Walter and said:
+"Lo thou, Squire! is not this a lovely thing to have grown up
+amongst our rough oak-boles?  What! art thou looking at the iron
+ring there?  It is nought, save a token that she is mine, and that I
+may not be without her."
+
+Then she took the Maid by the shoulders and turned her about as in
+sport, and said:  "Go thou now, and bring hither the good grey ones;
+for needs must we bring home some venison to-day, whereas this stout
+warrior may not feed on nought save manchets and honey."
+
+So the Maid went her way, taking care, as Walter deemed, to give no
+side glance to him.  But he stood there shamefaced, so confused with
+all this openhearted kindness of the great Lady and with the fresh
+sight of the darling beauty of the Maid, that he went nigh to
+thinking that all he had heard since he had come to the porch of the
+house that first time was but a dream of evil.
+
+But while he stood pondering these matters, and staring before him
+as one mazed, the Lady laughed out in his face, and touched him on
+the arm and said:  "Ah, our Squire, is it so that now thou hast seen
+my Maid thou wouldst with a good will abide behind to talk with her?
+But call to mind thy word pledged to me e'en now!  And moreover I
+tell thee this for thy behoof now she is out of ear-shot, that I
+will above all things take thee away to-day:  for there be other
+eyes, and they nought uncomely, that look at whiles on my fair-
+ankled thrall; and who knows but the swords might be out if I take
+not the better heed, and give thee not every whit of thy will."
+
+As she spoke and moved forward, he turned a little, so that now the
+edge of that hazel-coppice was within his eye-shot, and he deemed
+that once more he saw the yellow-brown evil thing crawling forth
+from the thicket; then, turning suddenly on the Lady, he met her
+eyes, and seemed in one moment of time to find a far other look in
+them than that of frankness and kindness; though in a flash they
+changed back again, and she said merrily and sweetly:  "So, so, Sir
+Squire, now art thou awake again, and mayest for a little while look
+on me."
+
+Now it came into his head, with that look of hers, all that might
+befall him and the Maid if he mastered not his passion, nor did what
+he might to dissemble; so he bent the knee to her, and spoke boldly
+to her in her own vein, and said:  "Nay, most gracious of ladies,
+never would I abide behind to-day since thou farest afield.  But if
+my speech be hampered, or mine eyes stray, is it not because my mind
+is confused by thy beauty, and the honey of kind words which floweth
+from thy mouth?"
+
+She laughed outright at his word, but not disdainfully, and said:
+"This is well spoken, Squire, and even what a squire should say to
+his liege lady, when the sun is up on a fair morning, and she and he
+and all the world are glad."
+
+She stood quite near him as she spoke, her hand was on his shoulder,
+and her eyes shone and sparkled.  Sooth to say, that excusing of his
+confusion was like enough in seeming to the truth; for sure never
+creature was fashioned fairer than she:  clad she was for the
+greenwood as the hunting-goddess of the Gentiles, with her green
+gown gathered unto her girdle, and sandals on her feet; a bow in her
+hand and a quiver at her back:  she was taller and bigger of fashion
+than the dear Maiden, whiter of flesh, and more glorious, and
+brighter of hair; as a flower of flowers for fairness and fragrance.
+
+She said:  "Thou art verily a fair squire before the hunt is up, and
+if thou be as good in the hunting, all will be better than well, and
+the guest will be welcome.  But lo! here cometh our Maid with the
+good grey ones.  Go meet her, and we will tarry no longer than for
+thy taking the leash in hand."
+
+So Walter looked, and saw the Maid coming with two couple of great
+hounds in the leash straining against her as she came along.  He ran
+lightly to meet her, wondering if he should have a look, or a half-
+whisper from her; but she let him take the white thongs from her
+hand, with the same half-smile of shamefacedness still set on her
+face, and, going past him, came softly up to the Lady, swaying like
+a willow-branch in the wind, and stood before her, with her arms
+hanging down by her sides.  Then the Lady turned to her, and said:
+"Look to thyself, our Maid, while we are away.  This fair young man
+thou needest not to fear indeed, for he is good and leal; but what
+thou shalt do with the King's Son I wot not.  He is a hot lover
+forsooth, but a hard man; and whiles evil is his mood, and perilous
+both to thee and me.  And if thou do his will, it shall be ill for
+thee; and if thou do it not, take heed of him, and let me, and me
+only, come between his wrath and thee.  I may do somewhat for thee.
+Even yesterday he was instant with me to have thee chastised after
+the manner of thralls; but I bade him keep silence of such words,
+and jeered him and mocked him, till he went away from me peevish and
+in anger.  So look to it that thou fall not into any trap of his
+contrivance."
+
+Then the Maid cast herself at the Mistress's feet, and kissed and
+embraced them; and as she rose up, the Lady laid her hand lightly on
+her head, and then, turning to Walter, cried out:  "Now, Squire, let
+us leave all these troubles and wiles and desires behind us, and
+flit through the merry greenwood like the Gentiles of old days."
+
+And therewith she drew up the laps of her gown till the whiteness of
+her knees was seen, and set off swiftly toward the wood that lay
+south of the house, and Walter followed, marvelling at her
+goodliness; nor durst he cast a look backward to the Maiden, for he
+knew that she desired him, and it was her only that he looked to for
+his deliverance from this house of guile and lies.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV:  THE HUNTING OF THE HART
+
+
+
+As they went, they found a change in the land, which grew emptier of
+big and wide-spreading trees, and more beset with thickets.  From
+one of these they roused a hart, and Walter let slip his hounds
+thereafter and he and the Lady followed running.  Exceeding swift
+was she, and well-breathed withal, so that Walter wondered at her;
+and eager she was in the chase as the very hounds, heeding nothing
+the scratching of briars or the whipping of stiff twigs as she sped
+on.  But for all their eager hunting, the quarry outran both dogs
+and folk, and gat him into a great thicket, amidmost whereof was a
+wide plash of water.  Into the thicket they followed him, but he
+took to the water under their eyes and made land on the other side;
+and because of the tangle of underwood, he swam across much faster
+than they might have any hope to come round on him; and so were the
+hunters left undone for that time.
+
+So the Lady cast herself down on the green grass anigh the water,
+while Walter blew the hounds in and coupled them up; then he turned
+round to her, and lo! she was weeping for despite that they had lost
+the quarry; and again did Walter wonder that so little a matter
+should raise a passion of tears in her.  He durst not ask what ailed
+her, or proffer her solace, but was not ill apaid by beholding her
+loveliness as she lay.
+
+Presently she raised up her head and turned to Walter, and spake to
+him angrily and said:  "Squire, why dost thou stand staring at me
+like a fool?"
+
+"Yea, Lady," he said; "but the sight of thee maketh me foolish to do
+aught else but to look on thee."
+
+She said, in a peevish voice:  "Tush, Squire, the day is too far
+spent for soft and courtly speeches; what was good there is nought
+so good here.  Withal, I know more of thine heart than thou
+deemest."
+
+Walter hung down his head and reddened, and she looked on him, and
+her face changed, and she smiled and said, kindly this time:  "Look
+ye, Squire, I am hot and weary, and ill-content; but presently it
+will be better with me; for my knees have been telling my shoulders
+that the cold water of this little lake will be sweet and pleasant
+this summer noonday, and that I shall forget my foil when I have
+taken my pleasure therein.  Wherefore, go thou with thine hounds
+without the thicket and there abide my coming.  And I bid thee look
+not aback as thou goest, for therein were peril to thee:  I shall
+not keep thee tarrying long alone."
+
+He bowed his head to her, and turned and went his ways.  And now,
+when he was a little space away from her, he deemed her indeed a
+marvel of women, and wellnigh forgat all his doubts and fears
+concerning her, whether she were a fair image fashioned out of lies
+and guile, or it might be but an evil thing in the shape of a goodly
+woman.  Forsooth, when he saw her caressing the dear and friendly
+Maid, his heart all turned against her, despite what his eyes and
+his ears told his mind, and she seemed like as it were a serpent
+enfolding the simplicity of the body which he loved.
+
+But now it was all changed, and he lay on the grass and longed for
+her coming; which was delayed for somewhat more than an hour.  Then
+she came back to him, smiling and fresh and cheerful, her green gown
+let down to her heels.
+
+He sprang up to meet her, and she came close to him, and spake from
+a laughing face:  "Squire, hast thou no meat in thy wallet?  For,
+meseemeth, I fed thee when thou wert hungry the other day; do thou
+now the same by me."
+
+He smiled, and louted to her, and took his wallet and brought out
+thence bread and flesh and wine, and spread them all out before her
+on the green grass, and then stood by humbly before her.  But she
+said:  "Nay, my Squire, sit down by me and eat with me, for to-day
+are we both hunters together."
+
+So he sat down by her trembling, but neither for awe of her
+greatness, nor for fear and horror of her guile and sorcery.
+
+A while they sat there together after they had done their meat, and
+the Lady fell a-talking with Walter concerning the parts of the
+earth, and the manners of men, and of his journeyings to and fro.
+
+At last she said:  "Thou hast told me much and answered all my
+questions wisely, and as my good Squire should, and that pleaseth
+me.  But now tell me of the city wherein thou wert born and bred; a
+city whereof thou hast hitherto told me nought."
+
+"Lady," he said, "it is a fair and a great city, and to many it
+seemeth lovely.  But I have left it, and now it is nothing to me."
+
+"Hast thou not kindred there?" said she.
+
+"Yea," said he, "and foemen withal; and a false woman waylayeth my
+life there."
+
+"And what was she?" said the Lady.
+
+Said Walter:  "She was but my wife."
+
+"Was she fair?" said the Lady.
+
+Walter looked on her a while, and then said:  "I was going to say
+that she was wellnigh as fair as thou; but that may scarce be.  Yet
+was she very fair.  But now, kind and gracious Lady, I will say this
+word to thee:  I marvel that thou askest so many things concerning
+the city of Langton on Holm, where I was born, and where are my
+kindred yet; for meseemeth that thou knowest it thyself."
+
+"I know it, I?" said the Lady.
+
+"What, then! thou knowest it not?" said Walter.
+
+Spake the Lady, and some of her old disdain was in her words:  "Dost
+thou deem that I wander about the world and its cheaping-steads like
+one of the chap-men?  Nay, I dwell in the Wood beyond the World, and
+nowhere else.  What hath put this word into thy mouth?"
+
+He said:  "Pardon me, Lady, if I have misdone; but thus it was:
+Mine own eyes beheld thee going down the quays of our city, and
+thence a ship-board, and the ship sailed out of the haven.  And
+first of all went a strange dwarf, whom I have seen here, and then
+thy Maid; and then went thy gracious and lovely body."
+
+The Lady's face changed as he spoke, and she turned red and then
+pale, and set her teeth; but she refrained her, and said:  "Squire,
+I see of thee that thou art no liar, nor light of wit, therefore I
+suppose that thou hast verily seen some appearance of me; but never
+have I been in Langton, nor thought thereof, nor known that such a
+stead there was until thou namedst it e'en now.  Wherefore, I deem
+that an enemy hath cast the shadow of me on the air of that land."
+
+"Yea, my Lady," said Walter; "and what enemy mightest thou have to
+have done this?"
+
+She was slow of answer, but spake at last from a quivering mouth of
+anger:  "Knowest thou not the saw, that a man's foes are they of his
+own house?  If I find out for a truth who hath done this, the said
+enemy shall have an evil hour with me."
+
+Again she was silent, and she clenched her hands and strained her
+limbs in the heat of her anger; so that Walter was afraid of her,
+and all his misgivings came back to his heart again, and he repented
+that he had told her so much.  But in a little while all that
+trouble and wrath seemed to flow off her, and again was she of good
+cheer, and kind and sweet to him and she said:  "But in sooth,
+however it may be, I thank thee, my Squire and friend, for telling
+me hereof.  And surely no wyte do I lay on thee.  And, moreover, is
+it not this vision which hath brought thee hither?"
+
+"So it is, Lady," said he.
+
+"Then have we to thank it," said the Lady, "and thou art welcome to
+our land."
+
+And therewith she held out her hand to him, and he took it on his
+knees and kissed it:  and then it was as if a red-hot iron had run
+through his heart, and he felt faint, and bowed down his head.  But
+he held her hand yet, and kissed it many times, and the wrist and
+the arm, and knew not where he was.
+
+But she drew a little away from him, and arose and said:  "Now is
+the day wearing, and if we are to bear back any venison we must
+buckle to the work.  So arise, Squire, and take the hounds and come
+with me; for not far off is a little thicket which mostly harbours
+foison of deer, great and small.  Let us come our ways."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV:  THE SLAYING OF THE QUARRY
+
+
+
+So they walked on quietly thence some half a mile, and ever the Lady
+would have Walter to walk by her side, and not follow a little
+behind her, as was meet for a servant to do; and she touched his
+hand at whiles as she showed him beast and fowl and tree, and the
+sweetness of her body overcame him, so that for a while he thought
+of nothing save her.
+
+Now when they were come to the thicket-side, she turned to him and
+said:  "Squire, I am no ill woodman, so that thou mayst trust me
+that we shall not be brought to shame the second time; and I shall
+do sagely; so nock an arrow to thy bow, and abide me here, and stir
+not hence; for I shall enter this thicket without the hounds, and
+arouse the quarry for thee; and see that thou be brisk and clean-
+shooting, and then shalt thou have a reward of me."
+
+Therewith she drew up her skirts through her girdle again, took her
+bent bow in her hand, and drew an arrow out of the quiver, and
+stepped lightly into the thicket, leaving him longing for the sight
+of her, as he hearkened to the tread of her feet on the dry leaves,
+and the rustling of the brake as she thrust through it.
+
+Thus he stood for a few minutes, and then he heard a kind of
+gibbering cry without words, yet as of a woman, coming from the
+thicket, and while his heart was yet gathering the thought that
+something had gone amiss, he glided swiftly, but with little stir,
+into the brake.
+
+He had gone but a little way ere he saw the Lady standing there in a
+narrow clearing, her face pale as death, her knees cleaving
+together, her body swaying and tottering, her hands hanging down,
+and the bow and arrow fallen to the ground; and ten yards before her
+a great-headed yellow creature crouching flat to the earth and
+slowly drawing nigher.
+
+He stopped short; one arrow was already notched to the string, and
+another hung loose to the lesser fingers of his string-hand.  He
+raised his right hand, and drew and loosed in a twinkling; the shaft
+flew close to the Lady's side, and straightway all the wood rung
+with a huge roar, as the yellow lion turned about to bite at the
+shaft which had sunk deep into him behind the shoulder, as if a bolt
+out of the heavens had smitten him.  But straightway had Walter
+loosed again, and then, throwing down his bow, he ran forward with
+his drawn sword gleaming in his hand, while the lion weltered and
+rolled, but had no might to move forward.  Then Walter went up to
+him warily and thrust him through to the heart, and leapt aback,
+lest the beast might yet have life in him to smite; but he left his
+struggling, his huge voice died out, and he lay there moveless
+before the hunter.
+
+Walter abode a little, facing him, and then turned about to the
+Lady, and she had fallen down in a heap whereas she stood, and lay
+there all huddled up and voiceless.  So he knelt down by her, and
+lifted up her head, and bade her arise, for the foe was slain.  And
+after a little she stretched out her limbs, and turned about on the
+grass, and seemed to sleep, and the colour came into her face again,
+and it grew soft and a little smiling.  Thus she lay awhile, and
+Walter sat by her watching her, till at last she opened her eyes and
+sat up, and knew him, and smiling on him said:  "What hath befallen,
+Squire, that I have slept and dreamed?"
+
+He answered nothing, till her memory came back to her, and then she
+arose, trembling and pale, and said:  "Let us leave this wood, for
+the Enemy is therein."
+
+And she hastened away before him till they came out at the thicket-
+side whereas the hounds had been left, and they were standing there
+uneasy and whining; so Walter coupled them, while the Lady stayed
+not, but went away swiftly homeward, and Walter followed.
+
+At last she stayed her swift feet, and turned round on Walter, and
+said:  "Squire, come hither."
+
+So did he, and she said:  "I am weary again; let us sit under this
+quicken-tree, and rest us."
+
+So they sat down, and she sat looking between her knees a while; and
+at last she said:  "Why didst thou not bring the lion's hide?"
+
+He said:  "Lady, I will go back and flay the beast, and bring on the
+hide."
+
+And he arose therewith, but she caught him by the skirts and drew
+him down, and said:  "Nay, thou shalt not go; abide with me.  Sit
+down again."
+
+He did so, and she said:  "Thou shalt not go from me; for I am
+afraid:  I am not used to looking on the face of death."
+
+She grew pale as she spoke, and set a hand to her breast, and sat so
+a while without speaking.  At last she turned to him smiling, and
+said:  "How was it with the aspect of me when I stood before the
+peril of the Enemy?"  And she laid a hand upon his.
+
+"O gracious one," quoth he, "thou wert, as ever, full lovely, but I
+feared for thee."
+
+She moved not her hand from his, and she said:  "Good and true
+Squire, I said ere I entered the thicket e'en now that I would
+reward thee if thou slewest the quarry.  He is dead, though thou
+hast left the skin behind upon the carcase.  Ask now thy reward, but
+take time to think what it shall be."
+
+He felt her hand warm upon his, and drew in the sweet odour of her
+mingled with the woodland scents under the hot sun of the afternoon,
+and his heart was clouded with manlike desire of her.  And it was a
+near thing but he had spoken, and craved of her the reward of the
+freedom of her Maid, and that he might depart with her into other
+lands; but as his mind wavered betwixt this and that, the Lady, who
+had been eyeing him keenly, drew her hand away from him; and
+therewith doubt and fear flowed into his mind, and he refrained him
+of speech.
+
+Then she laughed merrily and said:  "The good Squire is shamefaced;
+he feareth a lady more than a lion.  Will it be a reward to thee if
+I bid thee to kiss my cheek?"
+
+Therewith she leaned her face toward him, and he kissed her well-
+favouredly, and then sat gazing on her, wondering what should betide
+to him on the morrow.
+
+Then she arose and said:  "Come, Squire, and let us home; be not
+abashed, there shall be other rewards hereafter."
+
+So they went their ways quietly; and it was nigh sunset against they
+entered the house again.  Walter looked round for the Maid, but
+beheld her not; and the Lady said to him:  "I go to my chamber, and
+now is thy service over for this day."
+
+Then she nodded to him friendly and went her ways.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI:  OF THE KING'S SON AND THE MAID
+
+
+
+But as for Walter, he went out of the house again, and fared slowly
+over the woodlawns till he came to another close thicket or brake;
+he entered from mere wantonness, or that he might be the more apart
+and hidden, so as to think over his case.  There he lay down under
+the thick boughs, but could not so herd his thoughts that they would
+dwell steady in looking into what might come to him within the next
+days; rather visions of those two women and the monster did but
+float before him, and fear and desire and the hope of life ran to
+and fro in his mind.
+
+As he lay thus he heard footsteps drawing near, and he looked
+between the boughs, and though the sun had just set, he could see
+close by him a man and a woman going slowly, and they hand in hand;
+at first he deemed it would be the King's Son and the Lady, but
+presently he saw that it was the King's Son indeed, but that it was
+the Maid whom he was holding by the hand.  And now he saw of him
+that his eyes were bright with desire, and of her that she was very
+pale.  Yet when he heard her begin to speak, it was in a steady
+voice that she said:  "King's Son, thou hast threatened me oft and
+unkindly, and now thou threatenest me again, and no less unkindly.
+But whatever were thy need herein before, now is there no more need;
+for my Mistress, of whom thou wert weary, is now grown weary of
+thee, and belike will not now reward me for drawing thy love to me,
+as once she would have done; to wit, before the coming of this
+stranger.  Therefore I say, since I am but a thrall, poor and
+helpless, betwixt you two mighty ones, I have no choice but to do
+thy will."
+
+As she spoke she looked all round about her, as one distraught by
+the anguish of fear.  Walter, amidst of his wrath and grief, had
+wellnigh drawn his sword and rushed out of his lair upon the King's
+Son.  But he deemed it sure that, so doing, he should undo the Maid
+altogether, and himself also belike, so he refrained him, though it
+were a hard matter.
+
+The Maid had stayed her feet now close to where Walter lay, some
+five yards from him only, and he doubted whether she saw him not
+from where she stood.  As to the King's Son, he was so intent upon
+the Maid, and so greedy of her beauty, that it was not like that he
+saw anything.
+
+Now moreover Walter looked, and deemed that he beheld something
+through the grass and bracken on the other side of those two, an
+ugly brown and yellow body, which, if it were not some beast of the
+foumart kind, must needs be the monstrous dwarf, or one of his kin;
+and the flesh crept upon Walter's bones with the horror of him.  But
+the King's Son spoke unto the Maid:  "Sweetling, I shall take the
+gift thou givest me, neither shall I threaten thee any more, howbeit
+thou givest it not very gladly or graciously."
+
+She smiled on him with her lips alone, for her eyes were wandering
+and haggard.  "My lord," she said, "is not this the manner of
+women?"
+
+"Well," he said, "I say that I will take thy love even so given.
+Yet let me hear again that thou lovest not that vile newcomer, and
+that thou hast not seen him, save this morning along with my Lady.
+Nay now, thou shalt swear it."
+
+"What shall I swear by?" she said.
+
+Quoth he, "Thou shalt swear by my body;" and therewith he thrust
+himself close up against her; but she drew her hand from his, and
+laid it on his breast, and said:  "I swear it by thy body."
+
+He smiled on her licorously, and took her by the shoulders, and
+kissed her face many times, and then stood aloof from her, and said:
+"Now have I had hansel:  but tell me, when shall I come to thee?"
+
+She spoke out clearly:  "Within three days at furthest; I will do
+thee to wit of the day and the hour to-morrow, or the day after."
+
+He kissed her once more, and said:  "Forget it not, or the threat
+holds good."
+
+And therewith he turned about and went his ways toward the house;
+and Walter saw the yellow-brown thing creeping after him in the
+gathering dusk.
+
+As for the Maid, she stood for a while without moving, and looking
+after the King's Son and the creature that followed him.  Then she
+turned about to where Walter lay and lightly put aside the boughs,
+and Walter leapt up, and they stood face to face.  She said softly
+but eagerly:  "Friend, touch me not yet!"
+
+He spake not, but looked on her sternly.  She said:  "Thou art angry
+with me?"
+
+Still he spake not; but she said:  "Friend, this at least I will
+pray thee; not to play with life and death; with happiness and
+misery.  Dost thou not remember the oath which we swore each to each
+but a little while ago?  And dost thou deem that I have changed in
+these few days?  Is thy mind concerning thee and me the same as it
+was?  If it be not so, now tell me.  For now have I the mind to do
+as if neither thou nor I are changed to each other, whoever may have
+kissed mine unwilling lips, or whomsoever thy lips may have kissed.
+But if thou hast changed, and wilt no longer give me thy love, nor
+crave mine, then shall this steel" (and she drew a sharp knife from
+her girdle) "be for the fool and the dastard who hath made thee
+wroth with me, my friend, and my friend that I deemed I had won.
+And then let come what will come!  But if thou be nought changed,
+and the oath yet holds, then, when a little while hath passed, may
+we thrust all evil and guile and grief behind us, and long joy shall
+lie before us, and long life, and all honour in death:  if only thou
+wilt do as I bid thee, O my dear, and my friend, and my first
+friend!"
+
+He looked on her, and his breast heaved up as all the sweetness of
+her kind love took hold on him, and his face changed, and the tears
+filled his eyes and ran over, and rained down before her, and he
+stretched out his hand toward her.
+
+Then she said exceeding sweetly:  "Now indeed I see that it is well
+with me, yea, and with thee also.  A sore pain it is to me, that not
+even now may I take thine hand, and cast mine arms about thee, and
+kiss the lips that love me.  But so it has to be.  My dear, even so
+I were fain to stand here long before thee, even if we spake no more
+word to each other; but abiding here is perilous; for there is ever
+an evil spy upon my doings, who has now as I deem followed the
+King's Son to the house, but who will return when he has tracked him
+home thither:  so we must sunder.  But belike there is yet time for
+a word or two:  first, the rede which I had thought on for our
+deliverance is now afoot, though I durst not tell thee thereof, nor
+have time thereto.  But this much shall I tell thee, that whereas
+great is the craft of my Mistress in wizardry, yet I also have some
+little craft therein, and this, which she hath not, to change the
+aspect of folk so utterly that they seem other than they verily are;
+yea, so that one may have the aspect of another.  Now the next thing
+is this:  whatsoever my Mistress may bid thee, do her will therein
+with no more nay-saying than thou deemest may please her.  And the
+next thing:  wheresoever thou mayst meet me, speak not to me, make
+no sign to me, even when I seem to be all alone, till I stoop down
+and touch the ring on my ankle with my right hand; but if I do so,
+then stay thee, without fail, till I speak.  The last thing I will
+say to thee, dear friend, ere we both go our ways, this it is.  When
+we are free, and thou knowest all that I have done, I pray thee deem
+me not evil and wicked, and be not wroth with me for my deed;
+whereas thou wottest well that I am not in like plight with other
+women.  I have heard tell that when the knight goeth to the war, and
+hath overcome his foes by the shearing of swords and guileful
+tricks, and hath come back home to his own folk, they praise him and
+bless him, and crown him with flowers, and boast of him before God
+in the minster for his deliverance of friend and folk and city.  Why
+shouldst thou be worse to me than this?  Now is all said, my dear
+and my friend; farewell, farewell!"
+
+Therewith she turned and went her ways toward the house in all
+speed, but making somewhat of a compass.  And when she was gone,
+Walter knelt down and kissed the place where her feet had been, and
+arose thereafter, and made his way toward the house, he also, but
+slowly, and staying oft on his way.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII:  OF THE HOUSE AND THE PLEASANCE IN THE WOOD
+
+
+
+On the morrow morning Walter loitered a while about the house till
+the morn was grown old, and then about noon he took his bow and
+arrows and went into the woods to the northward, to get him some
+venison.  He went somewhat far ere he shot him a fawn, and then he
+sat him down to rest under the shade of a great chestnut-tree, for
+it was not far past the hottest of the day.  He looked around thence
+and saw below him a little dale with a pleasant stream running
+through it, and he bethought him of bathing therein, so he went down
+and had his pleasure of the water and the willowy banks; for he lay
+naked a while on the grass by the lip of the water, for joy of the
+flickering shade, and the little breeze that ran over the down-long
+ripples of the stream.
+
+Then he did on his raiment, and began to come his ways up the bent,
+but had scarce gone three steps ere he saw a woman coming towards
+him from downstream.  His heart came into his mouth when he saw her,
+for she stooped and reached down her arm, as if she would lay her
+hand on her ankle, so that at first he deemed it had been the Maid,
+but at the second eye-shot he saw that it was the Mistress.  She
+stood still and looked on him, so that he deemed she would have him
+come to her.  So he went to meet her, and grew somewhat shamefaced
+as he drew nigher, and wondered at her, for now was she clad but in
+one garment of some dark grey silky stuff, embroidered with, as it
+were, a garland of flowers about the middle, but which was so thin
+that, as the wind drifted it from side and limb, it hid her no more,
+but for the said garland, than if water were running over her:  her
+face was full of smiling joy and content as she spake to him in a
+kind, caressing voice, and said:  "I give thee good day, good
+Squire, and well art thou met."  And she held out her hand to him.
+He knelt down before her and kissed it, and abode still upon his
+knees, and hanging down his head.
+
+But she laughed outright, and stooped down to him, and put her hand
+to his arms, and raised him up, and said to him:  "What is this, my
+Squire, that thou kneelest to me as to an idol?"
+
+He said faltering:  "I wot not; but perchance thou art an idol; and
+I fear thee."
+
+"What!" she said, "more than yesterday, whenas thou sawest me
+afraid?"
+
+Said he:  "Yea, for that now I see thee unhidden, and meseemeth
+there hath been none such since the old days of the Gentiles."
+
+She said:  "Hast thou not yet bethought thee of a gift to crave of
+me, a reward for the slaying of mine enemy, and the saving of me
+from death?"
+
+"O my Lady," he said, "even so much would I have done for any other
+lady, or, forsooth, for any poor man; for so my manhood would have
+bidden me.  Speak not of gifts to me then.  Moreover" (and he
+reddened therewith, and his voice faltered), "didst thou not give me
+my sweet reward yesterday?  What more durst I ask?"
+
+She held her peace awhile, and looked on him keenly; and he reddened
+under her gaze.  Then wrath came into her face, and she reddened and
+knit her brows, and spake to him in a voice of anger, and said:
+"Nay, what is this?  It is growing in my mind that thou deemest the
+gift of me unworthy!  Thou, an alien, an outcast; one endowed with
+the little wisdom of the World without the Wood!  And here I stand
+before thee, all glorious in my nakedness, and so fulfilled of
+wisdom, that I can make this wilderness to any whom I love more full
+of joy than the kingdoms and cities of the world--and thou!--Ah, but
+it is the Enemy that hath done this, and made the guileless
+guileful!  Yet will I have the upper hand at least, though thou
+suffer for it, and I suffer for thee."
+
+Walter stood before her with hanging head, and he put forth his
+hands as if praying off her anger, and pondered what answer he
+should make; for now he feared for himself and the Maid; so at last
+he looked up to her, and said boldly:  "Nay, Lady, I know what thy
+words mean, whereas I remember thy first welcome of me.  I wot,
+forsooth, that thou wouldst call me base-born, and of no account,
+and unworthy to touch the hem of thy raiment; and that I have been
+over-bold, and guilty towards thee; and doubtless this is sooth, and
+I have deserved thine anger:  but I will not ask thee to pardon me,
+for I have done but what I must needs."
+
+She looked on him calmly now, and without any wrath, but rather as
+if she would read what was written in his inmost heart.  Then her
+face changed into joyousness again, and she smote her palms
+together, and cried out:  "This is but foolish talk; for yesterday
+did I see thy valiancy, and to-day I have seen thy goodliness; and I
+say, that though thou mightest not be good enough for a fool woman
+of the earthly baronage, yet art thou good enough for me, the wise
+and the mighty, and the lovely.  And whereas thou sayest that I gave
+thee but disdain when first thou camest to us, grudge not against me
+therefor, because it was done but to prove thee; and now thou art
+proven."
+
+Then again he knelt down before her, and embraced her knees, and
+again she raised him up, and let her arm hang down over his
+shoulder, and her cheek brush his cheek; and she kissed his mouth
+and said:  "Hereby is all forgiven, both thine offence and mine; and
+now cometh joy and merry days."
+
+Therewith her smiling face grew grave, and she stood before him
+looking stately and gracious and kind at once, and she took his hand
+and said:  "Thou mightest deem my chamber in the Golden House of the
+Wood over-queenly, since thou art no masterful man.  So now hast
+thou chosen well the place wherein to meet me to-day, for hard by on
+the other side of the stream is a bower of pleasance, which,
+forsooth, not every one who cometh to this land may find; there
+shall I be to thee as one of the up-country damsels of thine own
+land, and thou shalt not be abashed."
+
+She sidled up to him as she spoke, and would he, would he not, her
+sweet voice tickled his very soul with pleasure, and she looked
+aside on him happy and well-content.
+
+So they crossed the stream by the shallow below the pool wherein
+Walter had bathed, and within a little they came upon a tall fence
+of flake-hurdles, and a simple gate therein.  The Lady opened the
+same, and they entered thereby into a close all planted as a most
+fair garden, with hedges of rose and woodbine, and with linden-trees
+a-blossom, and long ways of green grass betwixt borders of lilies
+and clove-gilliflowers, and other sweet garland-flowers.  And a
+branch of the stream which they had crossed erewhile wandered
+through that garden; and in the midst was a little house built of
+post and pan, and thatched with yellow straw, as if it were new
+done.
+
+Then Walter looked this way and that, and wondered at first, and
+tried to think in his mind what should come next, and how matters
+would go with him; but his thought would not dwell steady on any
+other matter than the beauty of the Lady amidst the beauty of the
+garden; and withal she was now grown so sweet and kind, and even
+somewhat timid and shy with him, that scarce did he know whose hand
+he held, or whose fragrant bosom and sleek side went so close to
+him.
+
+So they wandered here and there through the waning of the day, and
+when they entered at last into the cool dusk house, then they loved
+and played together, as if they were a pair of lovers guileless,
+with no fear for the morrow, and no seeds of enmity and death sown
+betwixt them.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII:  THE MAID GIVES WALTER TRYST
+
+
+
+Now, on the morrow, when Walter was awake, he found there was no one
+lying beside him, and the day was no longer very young; so he arose,
+and went through the garden from end to end, and all about, and
+there was none there; and albeit that he dreaded to meet the Lady
+there, yet was he sad at heart and fearful of what might betide.
+Howsoever, he found the gate whereby they had entered yesterday, and
+he went out into the little dale; but when he had gone a step or two
+he turned about, and could see neither garden nor fence, nor any
+sign of what he had seen thereof but lately.  He knit his brow and
+stood still to think of it, and his heart grew the heavier thereby;
+but presently he went his ways and crossed the stream, but had
+scarce come up on to the grass on the further side, ere he saw a
+woman coming to meet him, and at first, full as he was of the tide
+of yesterday and the wondrous garden, deemed that it would be the
+Lady; but the woman stayed her feet, and, stooping, laid a hand on
+her right ankle, and he saw that it was the Maid.  He drew anigh to
+her, and saw that she was nought so sad of countenance as the last
+time she had met him, but flushed of cheek and bright-eyed.
+
+As he came up to her she made a step or two to meet him, holding out
+her two hands, and then refrained her, and said smiling:  "Ah,
+friend, belike this shall be the last time that I shall say to thee,
+touch me not, nay, not so much as my hand, or if it were but the hem
+of my raiment."
+
+The joy grew up in his heart, and he gazed on her fondly, and said:
+"Why, what hath befallen of late?"
+
+"O friend," she began, "this hath befallen."
+
+But as he looked on her, the smile died from her face, and she
+became deadly pale to the very lips; she looked askance to her left
+side, whereas ran the stream; and Walter followed her eyes, and
+deemed for one instant that he saw the misshapen yellow visage of
+the dwarf peering round from a grey rock, but the next there was
+nothing.  Then the Maid, though she were as pale as death, went on
+in a clear, steady, hard voice, wherein was no joy or kindness,
+keeping her face to Walter and her back to the stream:  "This hath
+befallen, friend, that there is no longer any need to refrain thy
+love nor mine; therefore I say to thee, come to my chamber (and it
+is the red chamber over against thine, though thou knewest it not)
+an hour before this next midnight, and then thy sorrow and mine
+shall be at an end:  and now I must needs depart.  Follow me not,
+but remember!"
+
+And therewith she turned about and fled like the wind down the
+stream.
+
+But Walter stood wondering, and knew not what to make of it, whether
+it were for good or ill:  for he knew now that she had paled and
+been seized with terror because of the upheaving of the ugly head;
+and yet she had seemed to speak out the very thing she had to say.
+Howsoever it were, he spake aloud to himself:  Whatever comes, I
+will keep tryst with her.
+
+Then he drew his sword, and turned this way and that, looking all
+about if he might see any sign of the Evil Thing; but nought might
+his eyes behold, save the grass, and the stream, and the bushes of
+the dale.  So then, still holding his naked sword in his hand, he
+clomb the bent out of the dale; for that was the only way he knew to
+the Golden House; and when he came to the top, and the summer breeze
+blew in his face, and he looked down a fair green slope beset with
+goodly oaks and chestnuts, he was refreshed with the life of the
+earth, and he felt the good sword in his fist, and knew that there
+was might and longing in him, and the world seemed open unto him.
+
+So he smiled, if it were somewhat grimly, and sheathed his sword and
+went on toward the house.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX:  WALTER GOES TO FETCH HOME THE LION'S HIDE
+
+
+
+He entered the cool dusk through the porch, and, looking down the
+pillared hall, saw beyond the fountain a gleam of gold, and when he
+came past the said fountain he looked up to the high-seat, and lo!
+the Lady sitting there clad in her queenly raiment.  She called to
+him, and he came; and she hailed him, and spake graciously and
+calmly, yet as if she knew nought of him save as the leal servant of
+her, a high Lady.  "Squire," she said, "we have deemed it meet to
+have the hide of the servant of the Enemy, the lion to wit, whom
+thou slewest yesterday, for a carpet to our feet; wherefore go now,
+take thy wood-knife, and flay the beast, and bring me home his skin.
+This shall be all thy service for this day, so mayst thou do it at
+thine own leisure, and not weary thyself.  May good go with thee."
+
+He bent the knee before her, and she smiled on him graciously, but
+reached out no hand for him to kiss, and heeded him but little.
+Wherefore, in spite of himself, and though he knew somewhat of her
+guile, he could not help marvelling that this should be she who had
+lain in his arms night-long but of late.
+
+Howso that might be, he took his way toward the thicket where he had
+slain the lion, and came thither by then it was afternoon, at the
+hottest of the day.  So he entered therein, and came to the very
+place whereas the Lady had lain, when she fell down before the
+terror of the lion; and there was the mark of her body on the grass
+where she had lain that while, like as it were the form of a hare.
+But when Walter went on to where he had slain that great beast, lo!
+he was gone, and there was no sign of him; but there were Walter's
+own footprints, and the two shafts which he had shot, one feathered
+red, and one blue.  He said at first:  Belike someone hath been
+here, and hath had the carcase away.  Then he laughed in very
+despite, and said:  How may that be, since there are no signs of
+dragging away of so huge a body, and no blood or fur on the grass if
+they had cut him up, and moreover no trampling of feet, as if there
+had been many men at the deed.  Then was he all abashed, and again
+laughed in scorn of himself, and said:  Forsooth I deemed I had done
+manly; but now forsooth I shot nought, and nought there was before
+the sword of my father's son.  And what may I deem now, but that
+this is a land of mere lies, and that there is nought real and alive
+therein save me.  Yea, belike even these trees and the green grass
+will presently depart from me, and leave me falling down through the
+clouds.
+
+Therewith he turned away, and gat him to the road that led to the
+Golden House, wondering what next should befall him, and going
+slowly as he pondered his case.  So came he to that first thicket
+where they had lost their quarry by water; so he entered the same,
+musing, and bathed him in the pool that was therein, after he had
+wandered about it awhile, and found nothing new.
+
+So again he set him to the homeward road, when the day was now
+waning, and it was near sunset that he was come nigh unto the house,
+though it was hidden from him as then by a low bent that rose before
+him; and there he abode and looked about him.
+
+Now as he looked, over the said bent came the figure of a woman, who
+stayed on the brow thereof and looked all about her, and then ran
+swiftly down to meet Walter, who saw at once that it was the Maid.
+
+She made no stay then till she was but three paces from him, and
+then she stooped down and made the sign to him, and then spake to
+him breathlessly, and said:  "Hearken! but speak not till I have
+done:  I bade thee to-night's meeting because I saw that there was
+one anigh whom I must needs beguile.  But by thine oath, and thy
+love, and all that thou art, I adjure thee come not unto me this
+night as I bade thee! but be hidden in the hazel-copse outside the
+house, as it draws toward midnight, and abide me there.  Dost thou
+hearken, and wilt thou?  Say yes or no in haste, for I may not tarry
+a moment of time.  Who knoweth what is behind me?"
+
+"Yes," said Walter hastily; "but friend and love--"
+
+"No more," she said; "hope the best;" and turning from him she ran
+away swiftly, not by the way she had come, but sideways, as though
+to reach the house by fetching a compass.
+
+But Walter went slowly on his way, thinking within himself that now
+at that present moment there was nought for it but to refrain him
+from doing, and to let others do; yet deemed he that it was little
+manly to be as the pawn upon the board, pushed about by the will of
+others.
+
+Then, as he went, he bethought him of the Maiden's face and aspect,
+as she came running to him, and stood before him for that minute;
+and all eagerness he saw in her, and sore love of him, and distress
+of soul, all blent together.
+
+So came he to the brow of the bent whence he could see lying before
+him, scarce more than a bow-shot away, the Golden House now gilded
+again and reddened by the setting sun.  And even therewith came a
+gay image toward him, flashing back the level rays from gold and
+steel and silver; and lo! there was come the King's Son.  They met
+presently, and the King's Son turned to go beside him, and said
+merrily:  "I give thee good even, my Lady's Squire!  I owe thee
+something of courtesy, whereas it is by thy means that I shall be
+made happy, both to-night, and to-morrow, and many to-morrows; and
+sooth it is, that but little courtesy have I done thee hitherto."
+
+His face was full of joy, and the eyes of him shone with gladness.
+He was a goodly man, but to Walter he seemed an ill one; and he
+hated him so much, that he found it no easy matter to answer him;
+but he refrained himself, and said:  "I can thee thank, King's Son;
+and good it is that someone is happy in this strange land."
+
+"Art thou not happy then, Squire of my Lady?" said the other.
+
+Walter had no mind to show this man his heart, nay, nor even a
+corner thereof; for he deemed him an enemy.  So he smiled sweetly
+and somewhat foolishly, as a man luckily in love, and said:  "O yea,
+yea, why should I not be so?  How might I be otherwise?"
+
+"Yea then," said the King's Son, "why didst thou say that thou wert
+glad someone is happy?  Who is unhappy, deemest thou?" and he looked
+on him keenly.
+
+Walter answered slowly:  "Said I so?  I suppose then that I was
+thinking of thee; for when first I saw thee, yea, and afterwards,
+thou didst seem heavy-hearted and ill-content."
+
+The face of the King's Son cleared at this word, and he said:  "Yea,
+so it was; for look you, both ways it was:  I was unfree, and I had
+sown the true desire of my heart whereas it waxed not.  But now I am
+on the brink and verge of freedom, and presently shall my desire be
+blossomed.  Nay now, Squire, I deem thee a good fellow, though it
+may be somewhat of a fool; so I will no more speak riddles to thee.
+Thus it is:  the Maid hath promised me all mine asking, and is mine;
+and in two or three days, by her helping also, I shall see the world
+again."
+
+Quoth Walter, smiling askance on him:  "And the Lady? what shall she
+say to this matter?"
+
+The King's Son reddened, but smiled falsely enough, and said:  "Sir
+Squire, thou knowest enough not to need to ask this.  Why should I
+tell thee that she accounteth more of thy little finger than of my
+whole body?  Now I tell thee hereof freely; first, because this my
+fruition of love, and my freeing from thralldom, is, in a way, of
+thy doing.  For thou art become my supplanter, and hast taken thy
+place with yonder lovely tyrant.  Fear not for me! she will let me
+go.  As for thyself, see thou to it!  But again I tell thee hereof
+because my heart is light and full of joy, and telling thee will
+pleasure me, and cannot do me any harm.  For if thou say:  How if I
+carry the tale to my Lady?  I answer, thou wilt not.  For I know
+that thine heart hath been somewhat set on the jewel that my hand
+holdeth; and thou knowest well on whose head the Lady's wrath would
+fall, and that would be neither thine nor mine."
+
+"Thou sayest sooth," said Walter; "neither is treason my wont."
+
+So they walked on silently a while, and then Walter said:  "But how
+if the Maiden had nay-said thee; what hadst thou done then?"
+
+"By the heavens!" said the King's Son fiercely, "she should have
+paid for her nay-say; then would I--"  But he broke off, and said
+quietly, yet somewhat doggedly:  "Why talk of what might have been?
+She gave me her yea-say pleasantly and sweetly."
+
+Now Walter knew that the man lied, so he held his peace thereon; but
+presently he said:  "When thou art free wilt thou go to thine own
+land again?"
+
+"Yea," said the King's Son; "she will lead me thither."
+
+"And wilt thou make her thy lady and queen when thou comest to thy
+father's land?" said Walter.
+
+The King's Son knit his brow, and said:  "When I am in mine own land
+I may do with her what I will; but I look for it that I shall do no
+otherwise with her than that she shall be well-content."
+
+Then the talk between them dropped, and the King's Son turned off
+toward the wood, singing and joyous; but Walter went soberly toward
+the house.  Forsooth he was not greatly cast down, for besides that
+he knew that the King's Son was false, he deemed that under this
+double tryst lay something which was a-doing in his own behalf.  Yet
+was he eager and troubled, if not down-hearted, and his soul was
+cast about betwixt hope and fear.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX:  WALTER IS BIDDEN TO ANOTHER TRYST
+
+
+
+So came he into the pillared hall, and there he found the Lady
+walking to and fro by the high-seat; and when he drew nigh she
+turned on him, and said in a voice rather eager than angry:  "What
+hast thou done, Squire?  Why art thou come before me?"
+
+He was abashed, and bowed before her and said:  "O gracious Lady,
+thou badest me service, and I have been about it."
+
+She said:  "Tell me then, tell me, what hath betided?"
+
+"Lady," said he, "when I entered the thicket of thy swooning I found
+there no carcase of the lion, nor any sign of the dragging away of
+him."
+
+She looked full in his face for a little, and then went to her
+chair, and sat down therein; and in a little while spake to him in a
+softer voice, and said:  "Did I not tell thee that some enemy had
+done that unto me? and lo! now thou seest that so it is."
+
+Then was she silent again, and knit her brows and set her teeth; and
+thereafter she spake harshly and fiercely:  "But I will overcome
+her, and make her days evil, but keep death away from her, that she
+may die many times over; and know all the sickness of the heart,
+when foes be nigh, and friends afar, and there is none to deliver!"
+
+Her eyes flashed, and her face was dark with anger; but she turned
+and caught Walter's eyes, and the sternness of his face, and she
+softened at once, and said:  "But thou! this hath little to do with
+thee; and now to thee I speak:  Now cometh even and night.  Go thou
+to thy chamber, and there shalt thou find raiment worthy of thee,
+what thou now art, and what thou shalt be; do on the same, and make
+thyself most goodly, and then come thou hither and eat and drink
+with me, and afterwards depart whither thou wilt, till the night has
+worn to its midmost; and then come thou to my chamber, to wit,
+through the ivory door in the gallery above; and then and there
+shall I tell thee a thing, and it shall be for the weal both of thee
+and of me, but for the grief and woe of the Enemy."
+
+Therewith she reached her hand to him, and he kissed it, and
+departed and came to his chamber, and found raiment therebefore rich
+beyond measure; and he wondered if any new snare lay therein:  yet
+if there were, he saw no way whereby he might escape it, so he did
+it on, and became as the most glorious of kings, and yet lovelier
+than any king of the world.
+
+Sithence he went his way into the pillared hall, when it was now
+night, and without the moon was up, and the trees of the wood as
+still as images.  But within the hall shone bright with many
+candles, and the fountain glittered in the light of them, as it ran
+tinkling sweetly into the little stream; and the silvern bridges
+gleamed, and the pillars shone all round about.
+
+And there on the dais was a table dight most royally, and the Lady
+sitting thereat, clad in her most glorious array, and behind her the
+Maid standing humbly, yet clad in precious web of shimmering gold,
+but with feet unshod, and the iron ring upon her ankle.
+
+So Walter came his ways to the high-seat, and the Lady rose and
+greeted him, and took him by the hands, and kissed him on either
+cheek, and sat him down beside her.  So they fell to their meat, and
+the Maid served them; but the Lady took no more heed of her than if
+she were one of the pillars of the hall; but Walter she caressed oft
+with sweet words, and the touch of her hand, making him drink out of
+her cup and eat out of her dish.  As to him, he was bashful by
+seeming, but verily fearful; he took the Lady's caresses with what
+grace he might, and durst not so much as glance at her Maid.  Long
+indeed seemed that banquet to him, and longer yet endured the
+weariness of his abiding there, kind to his foe and unkind to his
+friend; for after the banquet they still sat a while, and the Lady
+talked much to Walter about many things of the ways of the world,
+and he answered what he might, distraught as he was with the thought
+of those two trysts which he had to deal with.
+
+At last spake the Lady and said:  "Now must I leave thee for a
+little, and thou wottest where and how we shall meet next; and
+meanwhile disport thee as thou wilt, so that thou weary not thyself,
+for I love to see thee joyous."
+
+Then she arose stately and grand; but she kissed Walter on the mouth
+ere she turned to go out of the hall.  The Maid followed her; but or
+ever she was quite gone, she stooped and made that sign, and looked
+over her shoulder at Walter, as if in entreaty to him, and there was
+fear and anguish in her face; but he nodded his head to her in yea-
+say of the tryst in the hazel-copse, and in a trice she was gone.
+
+Walter went down the hall, and forth into the early night; but in
+the jaws of the porch he came up against the King's Son, who, gazing
+at his attire glittering with all its gems in the moonlight, laughed
+out, and said:  "Now may it be seen how thou art risen in degree
+above me, whereas I am but a king's son, and that a king of a far
+country; whereas thou art a king of kings, or shalt be this night,
+yea, and of this very country wherein we both are."
+
+Now Walter saw the mock which lay under his words; but he kept back
+his wrath, and answered:  "Fair sir, art thou as well contented with
+thy lot as when the sun went down?  Hast thou no doubt or fear?
+Will the Maid verily keep tryst with thee, or hath she given thee
+yea-say but to escape thee this time?  Or, again, may she not turn
+to the Lady and appeal to her against thee?"
+
+Now when he had spoken these words, he repented thereof, and feared
+for himself and the Maid, lest he had stirred some misgiving in that
+young man's foolish heart.  But the King's Son did but laugh, and
+answered nought but to Walter's last words, and said:  "Yea, yea!
+this word of thine showeth how little thou wottest of that which
+lieth betwixt my darling and thine.  Doth the lamb appeal from the
+shepherd to the wolf?  Even so shall the Maid appeal from me to thy
+Lady.  What! ask thy Lady at thy leisure what her wont hath been
+with her thrall; she shall think it a fair tale to tell thee
+thereof.  But thereof is my Maid all whole now by reason of her
+wisdom in leechcraft, or somewhat more.  And now I tell thee again,
+that the beforesaid Maid must needs do my will; for if I be the deep
+sea, and I deem not so ill of myself, that other one is the devil;
+as belike thou shalt find out for thyself later on.  Yea, all is
+well with me, and more than well."
+
+And therewith he swung merrily into the litten hall.  But Walter
+went out into the moonlit night, and wandered about for an hour or
+more, and stole warily into the hall and thence into his own
+chamber.  There he did off that royal array, and did his own raiment
+upon him; he girt him with sword and knife, took his bow and quiver,
+and stole down and out again, even as he had come in.  Then he
+fetched a compass, and came down into the hazel-coppice from the
+north, and lay hidden there while the night wore, till he deemed it
+would lack but little of midnight.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI:  WALTER AND THE MAID FLEE FROM THE GOLDEN HOUSE
+
+
+
+There he abode amidst the hazels, hearkening every littlest sound;
+and the sounds were nought but the night voices of the wood, till
+suddenly there burst forth from the house a great wailing cry.
+Walter's heart came up into his mouth, but he had no time to do
+aught, for following hard on the cry came the sound of light feet
+close to him, the boughs were thrust aside, and there was come the
+Maid, and she but in her white coat, and barefoot.  And then first
+he felt the sweetness of her flesh on his, for she caught him by the
+hand and said breathlessly:  "Now, now! there may yet be time, or
+even too much, it may be.  For the saving of breath ask me no
+questions, but come!"
+
+He dallied not, but went as she led, and they were lightfoot, both
+of them.
+
+They went the same way, due south to wit, whereby he had gone a-
+hunting with the Lady; and whiles they ran and whiles they walked;
+but so fast they went, that by grey of the dawn they were come as
+far as that coppice or thicket of the Lion; and still they hastened
+onward, and but little had the Maid spoken, save here and there a
+word to hearten up Walter, and here and there a shy word of
+endearment.  At last the dawn grew into early day, and as they came
+over the brow of a bent, they looked down over a plain land whereas
+the trees grew scatter-meal, and beyond the plain rose up the land
+into long green hills, and over those again were blue mountains
+great and far away.
+
+Then spake the Maid:  "Over yonder lie the outlying mountains of the
+Bears, and through them we needs must pass, to our great peril.
+Nay, friend," she said, as he handled his sword-hilt, "it must be
+patience and wisdom to bring us through, and not the fallow blade of
+one man, though he be a good one.  But look! below there runs a
+stream through the first of the plain, and I see nought for it but
+we must now rest our bodies.  Moreover I have a tale to tell thee
+which is burning my heart; for maybe there will be a pardon to ask
+of thee moreover; wherefore I fear thee."
+
+Quoth Walter:  "How may that be?"
+
+She answered him not, but took his hand and led him down the bent.
+But he said:  "Thou sayest, rest; but are we now out of all peril of
+the chase?"
+
+She said:  "I cannot tell till I know what hath befallen her.  If
+she be not to hand to set on her trackers, they will scarce happen
+on us now; if it be not for that one."
+
+And she shuddered, and he felt her hand change as he held it.
+
+Then she said:  "But peril or no peril, needs must we rest; for I
+tell thee again, what I have to say to thee burneth my bosom for
+fear of thee, so that I can go no further until I have told thee."
+
+Then he said:  "I wot not of this Queen and her mightiness and her
+servants.  I will ask thereof later.  But besides the others, is
+there not the King's Son, he who loves thee so unworthily?"
+
+She paled somewhat, and said:  "As for him, there had been nought
+for thee to fear in him, save his treason:  but now shall he neither
+love nor hate any more; he died last midnight."
+
+"Yea, and how?" said Walter.
+
+"Nay," she said, "let me tell my tale all together once for all,
+lest thou blame me overmuch.  But first we will wash us and comfort
+us as best we may, and then amidst our resting shall the word be
+said."
+
+By then were they come down to the stream-side, which ran fair in
+pools and stickles amidst rocks and sandy banks.  She said:  "There
+behind the great grey rock is my bath, friend; and here is thine;
+and lo! the uprising of the sun!"
+
+So she went her ways to the said rock, and he bathed him, and washed
+the night off him, and by then he was clad again she came back fresh
+and sweet from the water, and with her lap full of cherries from a
+wilding which overhung her bath.  So they sat down together on the
+green grass above the sand, and ate the breakfast of the wilderness:
+and Walter was full of content as he watched her, and beheld her
+sweetness and her loveliness; yet were they, either of them,
+somewhat shy and shamefaced each with the other; so that he did but
+kiss her hands once and again, and though she shrank not from him,
+yet had she no boldness to cast herself into his arms.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII:  OF THE DWARF AND THE PARDON
+
+
+
+Now she began to say:  "My friend, now shall I tell thee what I have
+done for thee and me; and if thou have a mind to blame me, and
+punish me, yet remember first, that what I have done has been for
+thee and our hope of happy life.  Well, I shall tell thee--"
+
+But therewithal her speech failed her; and, springing up, she faced
+the bent and pointed with her finger, and she all deadly pale, and
+shaking so that she might scarce stand, and might speak no word,
+though a feeble gibbering came from her mouth.
+
+Walter leapt up and put his arm about her, and looked whitherward
+she pointed, and at first saw nought; and then nought but a brown
+and yellow rock rolling down the bent:  and then at last he saw that
+it was the Evil Thing which had met him when first he came into that
+land; and now it stood upright, and he could see that it was clad in
+a coat of yellow samite.
+
+Then Walter stooped down and gat his bow into his hand, and stood
+before the Maid, while he nocked an arrow.  But the monster made
+ready his tackle while Walter was stooping down, and or ever he
+could loose, his bow-string twanged, and an arrow flew forth and
+grazed the Maid's arm above the elbow, so that the blood ran, and
+the Dwarf gave forth a harsh and horrible cry.  Then flew Walter's
+shaft, and true was it aimed, so that it smote the monster full on
+the breast, but fell down from him as if he were made of stone.
+Then the creature set up his horrible cry again, and loosed withal,
+and Walter deemed that he had smitten the Maid, for she fell down in
+a heap behind him.  Then waxed Walter wood-wroth, and cast down his
+bow and drew his sword, and strode forward towards the bent against
+the Dwarf.  But he roared out again, and there were words in his
+roar, and he said "Fool! thou shalt go free if thou wilt give up the
+Enemy."
+
+"And who," said Walter, "is the Enemy?"
+
+Yelled the Dwarf:  "She, the pink and white thing lying there; she
+is not dead yet; she is but dying for fear of me.  Yea, she hath
+reason!  I could have set the shaft in her heart as easily as
+scratching her arm; but I need her body alive, that I may wreak me
+on her."
+
+"What wilt thou do with her?" said Walter; for now he had heard that
+the Maid was not slain he had waxed wary again, and stood watching
+his chance.
+
+The Dwarf yelled so at his last word, that no word came from the
+noise a while, and then he said:  "What will I with her?  Let me at
+her, and stand by and look on, and then shalt thou have a strange
+tale to carry off with thee.  For I will let thee go this while."
+
+Said Walter:  "But what need to wreak thee?  What hath she done to
+thee?"
+
+"What need! what need!" roared the Dwarf; "have I not told thee that
+she is the Enemy?  And thou askest of what she hath done! of what!
+Fool, she is the murderer! she hath slain the Lady that was our
+Lady, and that made us; she whom all we worshipped and adored.  O
+impudent fool!"
+
+Therewith he nocked and loosed another arrow, which would have
+smitten Walter in the face, but that he lowered his head in the very
+nick of time; then with a great shout he rushed up the bent, and was
+on the Dwarf before he could get his sword out, and leaping aloft
+dealt the creature a stroke amidmost of the crown; and so mightily
+be smote, that he drave the heavy sword right through to the teeth,
+so that he fell dead straightway.
+
+Walter stood over him a minute, and when be saw that he moved not,
+he went slowly down to the stream, whereby the Maid yet lay cowering
+down and quivering all over, and covering her face with her hands.
+Then he took her by the wrist and said:  "Up, Maiden, up! and tell
+me this tale of the slaying."
+
+But she shrunk away from him, and looked at him with wild eyes, and
+said:  "What hast thou done with him?  Is he gone?"
+
+"He is dead," said Walter; "I have slain him; there lies he with
+cloven skull on the bent-side:  unless, forsooth, he vanish away
+like the lion I slew! or else, perchance, he will come to life
+again!  And art thou a lie like to the rest of them? let me hear of
+this slaying."
+
+She rose up, and stood before him trembling, and said:  "O, thou art
+angry with me, and thine anger I cannot bear.  Ah, what have I done?
+Thou hast slain one, and I, maybe, the other; and never had we
+escaped till both these twain were dead.  Ah! thou dost not know!
+thou dost not know!  O me! what shall I do to appease thy wrath!"
+
+He looked on her, and his heart rose to his mouth at the thought of
+sundering from her.  Still he looked on her, and her piteous
+friendly face melted all his heart; he threw down his sword, and
+took her by the shoulders, and kissed her face over and over, and
+strained her to him, so that he felt the sweetness of her bosom.
+Then he lifted her up like a child, and set her down on the green
+grass, and went down to the water, and filled his hat therefrom, and
+came back to her; then he gave her to drink, and bathed her face and
+her hands, so that the colour came aback to the cheeks and lips of
+her:  and she smiled on him and kissed his hands, and said:  "O now
+thou art kind to me."
+
+"Yea," said he, "and true it is that if thou hast slain, I have done
+no less, and if thou hast lied, even so have I; and if thou hast
+played the wanton, as I deem not that thou hast, I full surely have
+so done.  So now thou shalt pardon me, and when thy spirit has come
+back to thee, thou shalt tell me thy tale in all friendship, and in
+all loving-kindness will I hearken the same."
+
+Therewith he knelt before her and kissed her feet.  But she said:
+"Yea, yea; what thou willest, that will I do.  But first tell me one
+thing.  Hast thou buried this horror and hidden him in the earth?"
+
+He deemed that fear had bewildered her, and that she scarcely yet
+knew how things had gone.  But he said:  "Fair sweet friend, I have
+not done it as yet; but now will I go and do it, if it seem good to
+thee."
+
+"Yea," she said, "but first must thou smite off his head, and lie it
+by his buttocks when he is in the earth; or evil things will happen
+else.  This of the burying is no idle matter, I bid thee believe."
+
+"I doubt it not," said he; "surely such malice as was in this one
+will be hard to slay."  And he picked up his sword, and turned to go
+to the field of deed.
+
+She said:  "I must needs go with thee; terror hath so filled my
+soul, that I durst not abide here without thee."
+
+So they went both together to where the creature lay.  The Maid
+durst not look on the dead monster, but Walter noted that he was
+girt with a big ungainly sax; so he drew it from the sheath, and
+there smote off the hideous head of the fiend with his own weapon.
+Then they twain together laboured the earth, she with Walter's
+sword, he with the ugly sax, till they had made a grave deep and
+wide enough; and therein they thrust the creature, and covered him
+up, weapons and all together.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII:  OF THE PEACEFUL ENDING OF THAT WILD DAY
+
+
+
+Thereafter Walter led the Maid down again, and said to her:  "Now,
+sweetling, shall the story be told."
+
+"Nay, friend," she said, "not here.  This place hath been polluted
+by my craven fear, and the horror of the vile wretch, of whom no
+words may tell his vileness.  Let us hence and onward.  Thou seest I
+have once more come to life again."
+
+"But," said he, "thou hast been hurt by the Dwarf's arrow."
+
+She laughed, and said:  "Had I never had greater hurt from them than
+that, little had been the tale thereof:  yet whereas thou lookest
+dolorous about it, we will speedily heal it."
+
+Therewith she sought about, and found nigh the stream-side certain
+herbs; and she spake words over them, and bade Walter lay them on
+the wound, which, forsooth, was of the least, and he did so, and
+bound a strip of his shirt about her arm; and then would she set
+forth.  But he said:  "Thou art all unshod; and but if that be seen
+to, our journey shall be stayed by thy foot-soreness:  I may make a
+shift to fashion thee brogues."
+
+She said:  "I may well go barefoot.  And in any case, I entreat thee
+that we tarry here no longer, but go away hence, if it be but for a
+mile."
+
+And she looked piteously on him, so that he might not gainsay her.
+
+So then they crossed the stream, and set forward, when amidst all
+these haps the day was worn to midmorning.  But after they had gone
+a mile, they sat them down on a knoll under the shadow of a big
+thorn-tree, within sight of the mountains.  Then said Walter:  "Now
+will I cut thee the brogues from the skirt of my buff-coat, which
+shall be well meet for such work; and meanwhile shalt thou tell me
+thy tale."
+
+"Thou art kind," she said; "but be kinder yet, and abide my tale
+till we have done our day's work.  For we were best to make no long
+delay here; because, though thou hast slain the King-dwarf, yet
+there be others of his kindred, who swarm in some parts of the wood
+as the rabbits in a warren.  Now true it is that they have but
+little understanding, less, it may be, than the very brute beasts;
+and that, as I said afore, unless they be set on our slot like to
+hounds, they shall have no inkling of where to seek us, yet might
+they happen upon us by mere misadventure.  And moreover, friend,"
+quoth she, blushing, "I would beg of thee some little respite; for
+though I scarce fear thy wrath any more, since thou hast been so
+kind to me, yet is there shame in that which I have to tell thee.
+Wherefore, since the fairest of the day is before us, let us use it
+all we may, and, when thou hast done me my new foot-gear, get us
+gone forward again."
+
+He kissed her kindly and yea-said her asking:  he had already fallen
+to work on the leather, and in a while had fashioned her the
+brogues; so she tied them to her feet, and arose with a smile and
+said:  "Now am I hale and strong again, what with the rest, and what
+with thy loving-kindness, and thou shalt see how nimble I shall be
+to leave this land, for as fair as it is.  Since forsooth a land of
+lies it is, and of grief to the children of Adam."
+
+So they went their ways thence, and fared nimbly indeed, and made no
+stay till some three hours after noon, when they rested by a
+thicket-side, where the strawberries grew plenty; they ate thereof
+what they would:  and from a great oak hard by Walter shot him first
+one culver, and then another, and hung them to his girdle to be for
+their evening's meal; sithence they went forward again, and nought
+befell them to tell of, till they were come, whenas it lacked scarce
+an hour of sunset, to the banks of another river, not right great,
+but bigger than the last one.  There the Maid cast herself down and
+said:  "Friend, no further will thy friend go this even; nay, to say
+sooth, she cannot.  So now we will eat of thy venison, and then
+shall my tale be, since I may no longer delay it; and thereafter
+shall our slumber be sweet and safe as I deem."
+
+She spake merrily now, and as one who feared nothing, and Walter was
+much heartened by her words and her voice, and he fell to and made a
+fire, and a woodland oven in the earth, and sithence dighted his
+fowl, and baked them after the manner of wood-men.  And they ate,
+both of them, in all love, and in good-liking of life, and were much
+strengthened by their supper.  And when they were done, Walter eked
+his fire, both against the chill of the midnight and dawning, and
+for a guard against wild beasts, and by that time night was come,
+and the moon arisen.  Then the Maiden drew up to the fire, and
+turned to Walter and spake.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV:  THE MAID TELLS OF WHAT HAD BEFALLEN HER
+
+
+
+"Now, friend, by the clear of the moon and this firelight will I
+tell what I may and can of my tale.  Thus it is:  If I be wholly of
+the race of Adam I wot not nor can I tell thee how many years old I
+may be.  For there are, as it were, shards or gaps in my life,
+wherein are but a few things dimly remembered, and doubtless many
+things forgotten.  I remember well when I was a little child, and
+right happy, and there were people about me whom I loved, and who
+loved me.  It was not in this land; but all things were lovely
+there; the year's beginning, the happy mid-year, the year's waning,
+the year's ending, and then again its beginning.  That passed away,
+and then for a while is more than dimness, for nought I remember
+save that I was.  Thereafter I remember again, and am a young
+maiden, and I know some things, and long to know more.  I am nowise
+happy; I am amongst people who bid me go, and I go; and do this, and
+I do it:  none loveth me, none tormenteth me; but I wear my heart in
+longing for I scarce know what.  Neither then am I in this land, but
+in a land that I love not, and a house that is big and stately, but
+nought lovely.  Then is a dim time again, and sithence a time not
+right clear; an evil time, wherein I am older, wellnigh grown to
+womanhood.  There are a many folk about me, and they foul, and
+greedy, and hard; and my spirit is fierce, and my body feeble; and I
+am set to tasks that I would not do, by them that are unwiser than
+I; and smitten I am by them that are less valiant than I; and I know
+lack, and stripes, and divers misery.  But all that is now become
+but a dim picture to me, save that amongst all these unfriends is a
+friend to me; an old woman, who telleth me sweet tales of other
+life, wherein all is high and goodly, or at the least valiant and
+doughty, and she setteth hope in my heart and learneth me, and
+maketh me to know much . . . O much . . . so that at last I am grown
+wise, and wise to be mighty if I durst.  Yet am I nought in this
+land all this while, but, as meseemeth, in a great and a foul city."
+
+"And then, as it were, I fall asleep; and in my sleep is nought,
+save here and there a wild dream, somedeal lovely, somedeal hideous:
+but of this dream is my Mistress a part, and the monster, withal,
+whose head thou didst cleave to-day.  But when I am awaken from it,
+then am I verily in this land, and myself, as thou seest me to-day.
+And the first part of my life here is this, that I am in the
+pillared ball yonder, half-clad and with bound hands; and the Dwarf
+leadeth me to the Lady, and I hear his horrible croak as he sayeth:
+'Lady, will this one do?' and then the sweet voice of the Lady
+saying:  'This one will do; thou shalt have thy reward:  now, set
+thou the token upon her.'  Then I remember the Dwarf dragging me
+away, and my heart sinking for fear of him:  but for that time he
+did me no more harm than the rivetting upon my leg this iron ring
+which here thou seest."
+
+"So from that time forward I have lived in this land, and been the
+thrall of the Lady; and I remember my life here day by day, and no
+part of it has fallen into the dimness of dreams.  Thereof will I
+tell thee but little:  but this I will tell thee, that in spite of
+my past dreams, or it may be because of them, I had not lost the
+wisdom which the old woman had erst learned me, and for more wisdom
+I longed.  Maybe this longing shall now make both thee and me happy,
+but for the passing time it brought me grief.  For at first my
+Mistress was indeed wayward with me, but as any great lady might be
+with her bought thrall, whiles caressing me, and whiles chastising
+me, as her mood went; but she seemed not to be cruel of malice, or
+with any set purpose.  But so it was (rather little by little than
+by any great sudden uncovering of my intent), that she came to know
+that I also had some of the wisdom whereby she lived her queenly
+life.  That was about two years after I was first her thrall, and
+three weary years have gone by since she began to see in me the
+enemy of her days.  Now why or wherefore I know not, but it seemeth
+that it would not avail her to slay me outright, or suffer me to
+die; but nought withheld her from piling up griefs and miseries on
+my head.  At last she set her servant, the Dwarf, upon me, even he
+whose head thou clavest to-day.  Many things I bore from him whereof
+it were unseemly for my tongue to tell before thee; but the time
+came when he exceeded, and I could bear no more; and then I showed
+him this sharp knife (wherewith I would have thrust me through to
+the heart if thou hadst not pardoned me e'en now), and I told him
+that if he forbore me not, I would slay, not him, but myself; and
+this he might not away with because of the commandment of the Lady,
+who had given him the word that in any case I must be kept living.
+And her hand, withal, fear held somewhat hereafter.  Yet was there
+need to me of all my wisdom; for with all this her hatred grew, and
+whiles raged within her so furiously that it overmastered her fear,
+and at such times she would have put me to death if I had not
+escaped her by some turn of my lore."
+
+"Now further, I shall tell thee that somewhat more than a year ago
+hither to this land came the King's Son, the second goodly man, as
+thou art the third, whom her sorceries have drawn hither since I
+have dwelt here.  Forsooth, when he first came, he seemed to us, to
+me, and yet more to my Lady, to be as beautiful as an angel, and
+sorely she loved him; and he her, after his fashion:  but he was
+light-minded, and cold-hearted, and in a while he must needs turn
+his eyes upon me, and offer me his love, which was but foul and
+unkind as it turned out; for when I nay-said him, as maybe I had not
+done save for fear of my Mistress, he had no pity upon me, but
+spared not to lead me into the trap of her wrath, and leave me
+without help, or a good word.  But, O friend, in spite of all grief
+and anguish, I learned still, and waxed wise, and wiser, abiding the
+day of my deliverance, which has come, and thou art come."
+
+Therewith she took Walter's hands and kissed them; but he kissed her
+face, and her tears wet her lips.  Then she went on:  "But sithence,
+months ago, the Lady began to weary of this dastard, despite of his
+beauty; and then it was thy turn to be swept into her net; I partly
+guess how.  For on a day in broad daylight, as I was serving my
+Mistress in the hall, and the Evil Thing, whose head is now cloven,
+was lying across the threshold of the door, as it were a dream fell
+upon me, though I strove to cast it off for fear of chastisement;
+for the pillared hall wavered, and vanished from my sight, and my
+feet were treading a rough stone pavement instead of the marble
+wonder of the hall, and there was the scent of the salt sea and of
+the tackle of ships, and behind me were tall houses, and before me
+the ships indeed, with their ropes beating and their sails flapping
+and their masts wavering; and in mine ears was the hale and how of
+mariners; things that I had seen and heard in the dimness of my life
+gone by."
+
+"And there was I, and the Dwarf before me, and the Lady after me,
+going over the gangway aboard of a tall ship, and she gathered way
+and was gotten out of the haven, and straightway I saw the mariners
+cast abroad their ancient."
+
+Quoth Walter:  "What then!  Sawest thou the blazon thereon, of a
+wolf-like beast ramping up against a maiden?  And that might well
+have been thou."
+
+She said:  "Yea, so it was; but refrain thee, that I may tell on my
+tale!  The ship and the sea vanished away, but I was not back in the
+hall of the Golden House; and again were we three in the street of
+the self-same town which we had but just left; but somewhat dim was
+my vision thereof, and I saw little save the door of a goodly house
+before me, and speedily it died out, and we were again in the
+pillared hall, wherein my thralldom was made manifest."
+
+"Maiden," said Walter, "one question I would ask thee; to wit, didst
+thou see me on the quay by the ships?"
+
+"Nay," she said, "there were many folk about, but they were all as
+images of the aliens to me.  Now hearken further:  three months
+thereafter came the dream upon me again, when we were all three
+together in the Pillared Hall; and again was the vision somewhat
+dim.  Once more we were in the street of a busy town, but all unlike
+to that other one, and there were men standing together on our right
+hands by the door of a house."
+
+"Yea, yea," quoth Walter; "and, forsooth, one of them was who but
+I."
+
+"Refrain thee, beloved!" she said; "for my tale draweth to its
+ending, and I would have thee hearken heedfully:  for maybe thou
+shalt once again deem my deed past pardon.  Some twenty days after
+this last dream, I had some leisure from my Mistress's service, so I
+went to disport me by the Well of the Oak-tree (or forsooth she
+might have set in my mind the thought of going there, that I might
+meet thee and give her some occasion against me); and I sat thereby,
+nowise loving the earth, but sick at heart, because of late the
+King's Son had been more than ever instant with me to yield him my
+body, threatening me else with casting me into all that the worst
+could do to me of torments and shames day by day.  I say my heart
+failed me, and I was wellnigh brought to the point of yea-saying his
+desires, that I might take the chance of something befalling me that
+were less bad than the worst.  But here must I tell thee a thing,
+and pray thee to take it to heart.  This, more than aught else, had
+given me strength to nay-say that dastard, that my wisdom both hath
+been, and now is, the wisdom of a wise maid, and not of a woman, and
+all the might thereof shall I lose with my maidenhead.  Evil wilt
+thou think of me then, for all I was tried so sore, that I was at
+point to cast it all away, so wretchedly as I shrank from the horror
+of the Lady's wrath."
+
+"But there as I sat pondering these things, I saw a man coming, and
+thought no otherwise thereof but that it was the King's Son, till I
+saw the stranger drawing near, and his golden hair, and his grey
+eyes; and then I heard his voice, and his kindness pierced my heart,
+and I knew that my friend had come to see me; and O, friend, these
+tears are for the sweetness of that past hour!"
+
+Said Walter:  "I came to see my friend, I also.  Now have I noted
+what thou badest me; and I will forbear all as thou commandest me,
+till we be safe out of the desert and far away from all evil things;
+but wilt thou ban me from all caresses?"
+
+She laughed amidst of her tears, and said:  "O, nay, poor lad, if
+thou wilt be but wise."
+
+Then she leaned toward him, and took his face betwixt her hands and
+kissed him oft, and the tears started in his eyes for love and pity
+of her.
+
+Then she said:  "Alas, friend! even yet mayst thou doom me guilty,
+and all thy love may turn away from me, when I have told thee all
+that I have done for the sake of thee and me.  O, if then there
+might be some chastisement for the guilty woman, and not mere
+sundering!"
+
+"Fear nothing, sweetling," said he; "for indeed I deem that already
+I know partly what thou hast done."
+
+She sighed, and said:  "I will tell thee next, that I banned thy
+kissing and caressing of me till to-day because I knew that my
+Mistress would surely know if a man, if thou, hadst so much as
+touched a finger of mine in love, it was to try me herein that on
+the morning of the hunting she kissed and embraced me, till I almost
+died thereof, and showed thee my shoulder and my limbs; and to try
+thee withal, if thine eye should glister or thy cheek flush thereat;
+for indeed she was raging in jealousy of thee.  Next, my friend,
+even whiles we were talking together at the Well of the Rock, I was
+pondering on what we should do to escape from this land of lies.
+Maybe thou wilt say:  Why didst thou not take my hand and flee with
+me as we fled to-day?  Friend, it is most true, that were she not
+dead we had not escaped thus far.  For her trackers would have
+followed us, set on by her, and brought us back to an evil fate.
+Therefore I tell thee that from the first I did plot the death of
+those two, the Dwarf and the Mistress.  For no otherwise mightest
+thou live, or I escape from death in life.  But as to the dastard
+who threatened me with a thrall's pains, I heeded him nought to live
+or die, for well I knew that thy valiant sword, yea, or thy bare
+hands, would speedily tame him.  Now first I knew that I must make a
+show of yielding to the King's Son; and somewhat how I did therein,
+thou knowest.  But no night and no time did I give him to bed me,
+till after I had met thee as thou wentest to the Golden House,
+before the adventure of fetching the lion's skin; and up to that
+time I had scarce known what to do, save ever to bid thee, with sore
+grief and pain, to yield thee to the wicked woman's desire.  But as
+we spake together there by the stream, and I saw that the Evil Thing
+(whose head thou clavest e'en now) was spying on us, then amidst the
+sickness of terror which ever came over me whensoever I thought of
+him, and much more when I saw him (ah! he is dead now!), it came
+flashing into my mind how I might destroy my enemy.  Therefore I
+made the Dwarf my messenger to her, by bidding thee to my bed in
+such wise that he might hear it.  And wot thou well, that he
+speedily carried her the tidings.  Meanwhile I hastened to lie to
+the King's Son, and all privily bade him come to me and not thee.
+And thereafter, by dint of waiting and watching, and taking the only
+chance that there was, I met thee as thou camest back from fetching
+the skin of the lion that never was, and gave thee that warning, or
+else had we been undone indeed."
+
+Said Walter:  "Was the lion of her making or of thine then?"
+
+She said:  "Of hers:  why should I deal with such a matter?"
+
+"Yea," said Walter, "but she verily swooned, and she was verily
+wroth with the Enemy."
+
+The Maid smiled, and said:  "If her lie was not like very sooth,
+then had she not been the crafts-master that I knew her:  one may
+lie otherwise than with the tongue alone:  yet indeed her wrath
+against the Enemy was nought feigned; for the Enemy was even I, and
+in these latter days never did her wrath leave me.  But to go on
+with my tale."
+
+"Now doubt thou not, that, when thou camest into the hall yester
+eve, the Mistress knew of thy counterfeit tryst with me, and meant
+nought but death for thee; yet first would she have thee in her arms
+again, therefore did she make much of thee at table (and that was
+partly for my torment also), and therefore did she make that tryst
+with thee, and deemed doubtless that thou wouldst not dare to forgo
+it, even if thou shouldst go to me thereafter."
+
+"Now I had trained that dastard to me as I have told thee, but I
+gave him a sleepy draught, so that when I came to the bed he might
+not move toward me nor open his eyes:  but I lay down beside him, so
+that the Lady might know that my body had been there; for well had
+she wotted if it had not.  Then as there I lay I cast over him thy
+shape, so that none might have known but that thou wert lying by my
+side, and there, trembling, I abode what should befall.  Thus I
+passed through the hour whenas thou shouldest have been at her
+chamber, and the time of my tryst with thee was come as the Mistress
+would be deeming; so that I looked for her speedily, and my heart
+well-nigh failed me for fear of her cruelty."
+
+"Presently then I heard a stirring in her chamber, and I slipped
+from out the bed, and hid me behind the hangings, and was like to
+die for fear of her; and lo, presently she came stealing in softly,
+holding a lamp in one hand and a knife in the other.  And I tell
+thee of a sooth that I also had a sharp knife in my hand to defend
+my life if need were.  She held the lamp up above her head before
+she drew near to the bed-side, and I heard her mutter:  'She is not
+there then! but she shall be taken.'  Then she went up to the bed
+and stooped over it, and laid her hand on the place where I had
+lain; and therewith her eyes turned to that false image of thee
+lying there, and she fell a-trembling and shaking, and the lamp fell
+to the ground and was quenched (but there was bright moonlight in
+the room, and still I could see what betid).  But she uttered a
+noise like the low roar of a wild beast, and I saw her arm and hand
+rise up, and the flashing of the steel beneath the hand, and then
+down came the hand and the steel, and I went nigh to swooning lest
+perchance I had wrought over well, and thine image were thy very
+self.  The dastard died without a groan:  why should I lament him?
+I cannot.  But the Lady drew him toward her, and snatched the
+clothes from off his shoulders and breast, and fell a-gibbering
+sounds mostly without meaning, but broken here and there with words.
+Then I heard her say:  'I shall forget; I shall forget; and the new
+days shall come.'  Then was there silence of her a little, and
+thereafter she cried out in a terrible voice:  'O no, no, no!  I
+cannot forget; I cannot forget;' and she raised a great wailing cry
+that filled all the night with horror (didst thou not hear it?), and
+caught up the knife from the bed and thrust it into her breast, and
+fell down a dead heap over the bed and on to the man whom she had
+slain.  And then I thought of thee, and joy smote across my terror;
+how shall I gainsay it?  And I fled away to thee, and I took thine
+hands in mine, thy dear hands, and we fled away together.  Shall we
+be still together?"
+
+He spoke slowly, and touched her not, and she, forbearing all
+sobbing and weeping, sat looking wistfully on him.  He said:  "I
+think thou hast told me all; and whether thy guile slew her, or her
+own evil heart, she was slain last night who lay in mine arms the
+night before.  It was ill, and ill done of me, for I loved not her,
+but thee, and I wished for her death that I might be with thee.
+Thou wottest this, and still thou lovest me, it may be
+overweeningly.  What have I to say then?  If there be any guilt of
+guile, I also was in the guile; and if there be any guilt of murder,
+I also was in the murder.  Thus we say to each other; and to God and
+his Hallows we say:  'We two have conspired to slay the woman who
+tormented one of us, and would have slain the other; and if we have
+done amiss therein, then shall we two together pay the penalty; for
+in this have we done as one body and one soul.'"
+
+Therewith he put his arms about her and kissed her, but soberly and
+friendly, as if he would comfort her.  And thereafter he said to
+her:  "Maybe to-morrow, in the sunlight, I will ask thee of this
+woman, what she verily was; but now let her be.  And thou, thou art
+over-wearied, and I bid thee sleep."
+
+So he went about and gathered of bracken a great heap for her bed,
+and did his coat thereover, and led her thereto, and she lay down
+meekly, and smiled and crossed her arms over her bosom, and
+presently fell asleep.  But as for him, he watched by the fire-side
+till dawn began to glimmer, and then he also laid him down and
+slept.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV:  OF THE TRIUMPHANT SUMMER ARRAY OF THE MAID
+
+
+
+When the day was bright Walter arose, and met the Maid coming from
+the river-bank, fresh and rosy from the water.  She paled a little
+when they met face to face, and she shrank from him shyly.  But he
+took her hand and kissed her frankly; and the two were glad, and had
+no need to tell each other of their joy, though much else they
+deemed they had to say, could they have found words thereto.
+
+So they came to their fire and sat down, and fell to breakfast; and
+ere they were done, the Maid said:  "My Master, thou seest we be
+come nigh unto the hill-country, and to-day about sunset, belike, we
+shall come into the Land of the Bear-folk; and both it is, that
+there is peril if we fall into their hands, and that we may scarce
+escape them.  Yet I deem that we may deal with the peril by wisdom."
+
+"What is the peril?" said Walter; "I mean, what is the worst of it?"
+
+Said the Maid:  "To be offered up in sacrifice to their God."
+
+"But if we escape death at their hands, what then?" said Walter.
+
+"One of two things," said she; "the first that they shall take us
+into their tribe."
+
+"And will they sunder us in that case?" said Walter.
+
+"Nay," said she.
+
+Walter laughed and said:  "Therein is little harm then.  But what is
+the other chance?"
+
+Said she:  "That we leave them with their goodwill, and come back to
+one of the lands of Christendom."
+
+Said Walter:  "I am not all so sure that this is the better of the
+two choices, though, forsooth, thou seemest to think so.  But tell
+me now, what like is their God, that they should offer up new-comers
+to him?"
+
+"Their God is a woman," she said, "and the Mother of their nation
+and tribes (or so they deem) before the days when they had
+chieftains and Lords of Battle."
+
+"That will be long ago," said he; "how then may she be living now?"
+
+Said the Maid:  "Doubtless that woman of yore agone is dead this
+many and many a year; but they take to them still a new woman, one
+after other, as they may happen on them, to be in the stead of the
+Ancient Mother.  And to tell thee the very truth right out, she that
+lieth dead in the Pillared Hall was even the last of these; and now,
+if they knew it, they lack a God.  This shall we tell them."
+
+"Yea, yea!" said Walter, "a goodly welcome shall we have of them
+then, if we come amongst them with our hands red with the blood of
+their God!"
+
+She smiled on him and said:  "If I come amongst them with the
+tidings that I have slain her, and they trow therein, without doubt
+they shall make me Lady and Goddess in her stead."
+
+"This is a strange word," said Walter "but if so they do, how shall
+that further us in reaching the kindreds of the world, and the folk
+of Holy Church?"
+
+She laughed outright, so joyous was she grown, now that she knew
+that his life was yet to be a part of hers.  "Sweetheart," she said,
+"now I see that thou desirest wholly what I desire; yet in any case,
+abiding with them would be living and not dying, even as thou hadst
+it e'en now.  But, forsooth, they will not hinder our departure if
+they deem me their God; they do not look for it, nor desire it, that
+their God should dwell with them daily.  Have no fear."  Then she
+laughed again, and said:  "What! thou lookest on me and deemest me
+to be but a sorry image of a goddess; and me with my scanty coat and
+bare arms and naked feet!  But wait!  I know well how to array me
+when the time cometh.  Thou shalt see it!  And now, my Master, were
+it not meet that we took to the road?"
+
+So they arose, and found a ford of the river that took the Maid but
+to the knee, and so set forth up the greensward of the slopes
+whereas there were but few trees; so went they faring toward the
+hill-country.
+
+At the last they were come to the feet of the very hills, and in the
+hollows betwixt the buttresses of them grew nut and berry trees, and
+the greensward round about them was both thick and much flowery.
+There they stayed them and dined, whereas Walter had shot a hare by
+the way, and they had found a bubbling spring under a grey stone in
+a bight of the coppice, wherein now the birds were singing their
+best.
+
+When they had eaten and had rested somewhat, the Maid arose and
+said:  "Now shall the Queen array herself, and seem like a very
+goddess."
+
+Then she fell to work, while Walter looked on; and she made a
+garland for her head of eglantine where the roses were the fairest;
+and with mingled flowers of the summer she wreathed her middle
+about, and let the garland of them hang down to below her knees; and
+knots of the flowers she made fast to the skirts of her coat, and
+did them for arm-rings about her arms, and for anklets and sandals
+for her feet.  Then she set a garland about Walter's head, and then
+stood a little off from him and set her feet together, and lifted up
+her arms, and said:  "Lo now! am I not as like to the Mother of
+Summer as if I were clad in silk and gold? and even so shall I be
+deemed by the folk of the Bear.  Come now, thou shalt see how all
+shall be well."
+
+She laughed joyously; but he might scarce laugh for pity of his
+love.  Then they set forth again, and began to climb the hills, and
+the hours wore as they went in sweet converse; till at last Walter
+looked on the Maid, and smiled on her, and said:  "One thing I would
+say to thee, lovely friend, to wit:  wert thou clad in silk and
+gold, thy stately raiment might well suffer a few stains, or here
+and there a rent maybe; but stately would it be still when the folk
+of the Bear should come up against thee.  But as to this flowery
+array of thine, in a few hours it shall be all faded and nought.
+Nay, even now, as I look on thee, the meadow-sweet that hangeth from
+thy girdle-stead has waxen dull, and welted; and the blossoming
+eyebright that is for a hem to the little white coat of thee is
+already forgetting how to be bright and blue.  What sayest thou
+then?"
+
+She laughed at his word, and stood still, and looked back over her
+shoulder, while with her fingers she dealt with the flowers about
+her side like to a bird preening his feathers.  Then she said:  "Is
+it verily so as thou sayest?  Look again!"
+
+So he looked, and wondered; for lo! beneath his eyes the spires of
+the meadow-sweet grew crisp and clear again, the eyebright blossoms
+shone once more over the whiteness of her legs; the eglantine roses
+opened, and all was as fresh and bright as if it were still growing
+on its own roots.
+
+He wondered, and was even somedeal aghast; but she said:  "Dear
+friend, be not troubled! did I not tell thee that I am wise in
+hidden lore?  But in my wisdom shall be no longer any scathe to any
+man.  And again, this my wisdom, as I told thee erst, shall end on
+the day whereon I am made all happy.  And it is thou that shall
+wield it all, my Master.  Yet must my wisdom needs endure for a
+little season yet.  Let us on then, boldly and happily."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI:  THEY COME TO THE FOLK OF THE BEARS
+
+
+
+On they went, and before long they were come up on to the down-
+country, where was scarce a tree, save gnarled and knotty thorn-
+bushes here and there, but nought else higher than the whin.  And
+here on these upper lands they saw that the pastures were much
+burned with the drought, albeit summer was not worn old.  Now they
+went making due south toward the mountains, whose heads they saw
+from time to time rising deep blue over the bleak greyness of the
+down-land ridges.  And so they went, till at last, hard on sunset,
+after they had climbed long over a high bent, they came to the brow
+thereof, and, looking down, beheld new tidings.
+
+There was a wide valley below them, greener than the downs which
+they had come over, and greener yet amidmost, from the watering of a
+stream which, all beset with willows, wound about the bottom.  Sheep
+and neat were pasturing about the dale, and moreover a long line of
+smoke was going up straight into the windless heavens from the midst
+of a ring of little round houses built of turfs, and thatched with
+reed.  And beyond that, toward an eastward-lying bight of the dale,
+they could see what looked like to a doom-ring of big stones, though
+there were no rocky places in that land.  About the cooking-fire
+amidst of the houses, and here and there otherwhere, they saw,
+standing or going to and fro, huge figures of men and women, with
+children playing about betwixt them.
+
+They stood and gazed down at it for a minute or two, and though all
+were at peace there, yet to Walter, at least, it seemed strange and
+awful.  He spake softly, as though he would not have his voice reach
+those men, though they were, forsooth, out of earshot of anything
+save a shout:  "Are these then the children of the Bear?  What shall
+we do now?"
+
+She said:  "Yea, of the Bear they be, though there be other folks of
+them far and far away to the northward and eastward, near to the
+borders of the sea.  And as to what we shall do, let us go down at
+once, and peacefully.  Indeed, by now there will be no escape from
+them; for lo you! they have seen us."
+
+Forsooth, some three or four of the big men had turned them toward
+the bent whereon stood the twain, and were hailing them in huge,
+rough voices, wherein, howsoever, seemed to be no anger or threat.
+So the Maid took Walter by the hand, and thus they went down
+quietly, and the Bear-folk, seeing them, stood all together, facing
+them, to abide their coming.  Walter saw of them, that though they
+were very tall and bigly made, they were not so far above the
+stature of men as to be marvels.  The carles were long-haired, and
+shaggy of beard, and their hair all red or tawny; their skins, where
+their naked flesh showed, were burned brown with sun and weather,
+but to a fair and pleasant brown, nought like to blackamoors.  The
+queans were comely and well-eyed; nor was there anything of fierce
+or evil-looking about either the carles or the queans, but somewhat
+grave and solemn of aspect were they.  Clad were they all, saving
+the young men-children, but somewhat scantily, and in nought save
+sheep-skins or deer-skins.
+
+For weapons they saw amongst them clubs, and spears headed with bone
+or flint, and ugly axes of big flints set in wooden handles; nor was
+there, as far as they could see, either now or afterward, any bow
+amongst them.  But some of the young men seemed to have slings done
+about their shoulders.
+
+Now when they were come but three fathom from them, the Maid lifted
+up her voice, and spake clearly and sweetly:  "Hail, ye folk of the
+Bears! we have come amongst you, and that for your good and not for
+your hurt:  wherefore we would know if we be welcome."
+
+There was an old man who stood foremost in the midst, clad in a
+mantle of deer-skins worked very goodly, and with a gold ring on his
+arm, and a chaplet of blue stones on his head, and he spake:
+"Little are ye, but so goodly, that if ye were but bigger, we should
+deem that ye were come from the Gods' House.  Yet have I heard, that
+how mighty soever may the Gods be, and chiefly our God, they be at
+whiles nought so bigly made as we of the Bears.  How this may be, I
+wot not.  But if ye be not of the Gods or their kindred, then are ye
+mere aliens; and we know not what to do with aliens, save we meet
+them in battle, or give them to the God, or save we make them
+children of the Bear.  But yet again, ye may be messengers of some
+folk who would bind friendship and alliance with us:  in which case
+ye shall at the least depart in peace, and whiles ye are with us
+shall be our guests in all good cheer.  Now, therefore, we bid you
+declare the matter unto us."
+
+Then spake the Maid:  "Father, it were easy for us to declare what
+we be unto you here present.  But, meseemeth, ye who be gathered
+round the fire here this evening are less than the whole tale of the
+children of the Bear."
+
+"So it is, Maiden," said the elder, "that many more children hath
+the Bear."
+
+"This then we bid you," said the Maid, "that ye send the tokens
+round and gather your people to you, and when they be assembled in
+the Doom-ring, then shall we put our errand before you; and
+according to that, shall ye deal with us."
+
+"Thou hast spoken well," said the elder; "and even so had we bidden
+you ourselves.  To-morrow, before noon, shall ye stand in the Doom-
+ring in this Dale, and speak with the children of the Bear."
+
+Therewith he turned to his own folk and called out something,
+whereof those twain knew not the meaning; and there came to him, one
+after another, six young men, unto each of whom he gave a thing from
+out his pouch, but what it was Walter might not see, save that it
+was little and of small account:  to each, also, he spake a word or
+two, and straight they set off running, one after the other, turning
+toward the bent which was over against that whereby the twain had
+come into the Dale, and were soon out of sight in the gathering
+dusk.
+
+Then the elder turned him again to Walter and the Maid, and spake:
+"Man and woman, whatsoever ye may be, or whatsoever may abide you
+to-morrow, to-night, ye are welcome guests to us; so we bid you come
+eat and drink at our fire."
+
+So they sat all together upon the grass round about the embers of
+the fire, and ate curds and cheese, and drank milk in abundance; and
+as the night grew on them they quickened the fire, that they might
+have light.  This wild folk talked merrily amongst themselves, with
+laughter enough and friendly jests, but to the new-comers they were
+few-spoken, though, as the twain deemed, for no enmity that they
+bore them.  But this found Walter, that the younger ones, both men
+and women, seemed to find it a hard matter to keep their eyes off
+them; and seemed, withal, to gaze on them with somewhat of doubt,
+or, it might be, of fear.
+
+So when the night was wearing a little, the elder arose and bade the
+twain to come with him, and led them to a small house or booth,
+which was amidmost of all, and somewhat bigger than the others, and
+he did them to wit that they should rest there that night, and bade
+them sleep in peace and without fear till the morrow.  So they
+entered, and found beds thereon of heather and ling, and they laid
+them down sweetly, like brother and sister, when they had kissed
+each other.  But they noted that four brisk men lay without the
+booth, and across the door, with their weapons beside them, so that
+they must needs look upon themselves as captives.
+
+Then Walter might not refrain him, but spake:  "Sweet and dear
+friend, I have come a long way from the quay at Langton, and the
+vision of the Dwarf, the Maid, and the Lady; and for this kiss
+wherewith I have kissed thee e'en now, and the kindness of thine
+eyes, it was worth the time and the travail.  But to-morrow,
+meseemeth, I shall go no further in this world, though my journey be
+far longer than from Langton hither.  And now may God and All
+Hallows keep thee amongst this wild folk, whenas I shall be gone
+from thee."
+
+She laughed low and sweetly, and said:  "Dear friend, dost thou
+speak to me thus mournfully to move me to love thee better?  Then is
+thy labour lost; for no better may I love thee than now I do; and
+that is with mine whole heart.  But keep a good courage, I bid thee;
+for we be not sundered yet, nor shall we be.  Nor do I deem that we
+shall die here, or to-morrow; but many years hence, after we have
+known all the sweetness of life.  Meanwhile, I bid thee good-night,
+fair friend!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII:  MORNING AMONGST THE BEARS
+
+
+
+So Walter laid him down and fell asleep, and knew no more till he
+awoke in bright daylight with the Maid standing over him.  She was
+fresh from the water, for she had been to the river to bathe her,
+and the sun through the open door fell streaming on her feet close
+to Walter's pillow.  He turned about and cast his arm about them,
+and caressed them, while she stood smiling upon him; then he arose
+and looked on her, and said:  "How thou art fair and bright this
+morning!  And yet . . . and yet . . . were it not well that thou do
+off thee all this faded and drooping bravery of leaves and blossoms,
+that maketh thee look like to a jongleur's damsel on a morrow of
+May-day?"
+
+And he gazed ruefully on her.
+
+She laughed on him merrily, and said:  "Yea, and belike these others
+think no better of my attire, or not much better; for yonder they
+are gathering small wood for the burnt-offering; which, forsooth,
+shall be thou and I, unless I better it all by means of the wisdom I
+learned of the old woman, and perfected betwixt the stripes of my
+Mistress, whom a little while ago thou lovedst somewhat."
+
+And as she spake her eyes sparkled, her cheek flushed, and her limbs
+and her feet seemed as if they could scarce refrain from dancing for
+joy.  Then Walter knit his brow, and for a moment a thought half-
+framed was in his mind:  Is it so, that she will bewray me and live
+without me? and he cast his eyes on to the ground.  But she said:
+"Look up, and into mine eyes, friend, and see if there be in them
+any falseness toward thee!  For I know thy thought; I know thy
+thought.  Dost thou not see that my joy and gladness is for the love
+of thee, and the thought of the rest from trouble that is at hand?"
+
+He looked up, and his eyes met the eyes of her love, and he would
+have cast his arms about her; but she drew aback and said:  "Nay,
+thou must refrain thee awhile, dear friend, lest these folk cast
+eyes on us, and deem us over lover-like for what I am to bid them
+deem me.  Abide a while, and then shall all be in me according to
+thy will.  But now I must tell thee that it is not very far from
+noon, and that the Bears are streaming into the Dale, and already
+there is an host of men at the Doom-ring, and, as I said, the bale
+for the burnt-offering is wellnigh dight, whether it be for us, or
+for some other creature.  And now I have to bid thee this, and it
+will be a thing easy for thee to do, to wit, that thou look as if
+thou wert of the race of the Gods, and not to blench, or show sign
+of blenching, whatever betide:  to yea-say both my yea-say and my
+nay-say:  and lastly this, which is the only hard thing for thee
+(but thou hast already done it before somewhat), to look upon me
+with no masterful eyes of love, nor as if thou wert at once praying
+me and commanding me; rather thou shalt so demean thee as if thou
+wert my man all simply, and nowise my master."
+
+"O friend beloved," said Walter, "here at least art thou the master,
+and I will do all thy bidding, in certain hope of this, that either
+we shall live together or die together."
+
+But as they spoke, in came the elder, and with him a young maiden,
+bearing with them their breakfast of curds arid cream and
+strawberries, and he bade them eat.  So they ate, and were not
+unmerry; and the while of their eating the elder talked with them
+soberly, but not hardly, or with any seeming enmity:  and ever his
+talk gat on to the drought, which was now burning up the down-
+pastures; and how the grass in the watered dales, which was no wide
+spread of land, would not hold out much longer unless the God sent
+them rain.  And Walter noted that those two, the elder and the Maid,
+eyed each other curiously amidst of this talk; the elder intent on
+what she might say, and if she gave heed to his words; while on her
+side the Maid answered his speech graciously and pleasantly, but
+said little that was of any import:  nor would she have him fix her
+eyes, which wandered lightly from this thing to that; nor would her
+lips grow stern and stable, but ever smiled in answer to the light
+of her eyes, as she sat there with her face as the very face of the
+gladness of the summer day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII:  OF THE NEW GOD OF THE BEARS
+
+
+
+At last the old man said:  "My children, ye shall now come with me
+unto the Doom-ring of our folk, the Bears of the Southern Dales, and
+deliver to them your errand; and I beseech you to have pity upon
+your own bodies, as I have pity on them; on thine especially,
+Maiden, so fair and bright a creature as thou art; for so it is,
+that if ye deal us out light and lying words after the manner of
+dastards, ye shall miss the worship and glory of wending away amidst
+of the flames, a gift to the God and a hope to the people, and shall
+be passed by the rods of the folk, until ye faint and fail amongst
+them, and then shall ye be thrust down into the flow at the Dale's
+End, and a stone-laden hurdle cast upon you, that we may thenceforth
+forget your folly."
+
+The Maid now looked full into his eyes, and Walter deemed that the
+old man shrank before her; but she said:  "Thou art old and wise, O
+great man of the Bears, yet nought I need to learn of thee.  Now
+lead us on our way to the Stead of the Errands."
+
+So the elder brought them along to the Doom-ring at the eastern end
+of the Dale; and it was now all peopled with those huge men,
+weaponed after their fashion, and standing up, so that the grey
+stones thereof but showed a little over their heads.  But amidmost
+of the said Ring was a big stone, fashioned as a chair, whereon sat
+a very old man, long-hoary and white-bearded, and on either side of
+him stood a great-limbed woman clad in war-gear, holding, each of
+them, a long spear, and with a flint-bladed knife in the girdle; and
+there were no other women in all the Mote.
+
+Then the elder led those twain into the midst of the Mote, and there
+bade them go up on to a wide, flat-topped stone, six feet above the
+ground, just over against the ancient chieftain; and they mounted it
+by a rough stair, and stood there before that folk; Walter in his
+array of the outward world, which had been fair enough, of crimson
+cloth and silk, and white linen, but was now travel-stained and
+worn; and the Maid with nought upon her, save the smock wherein she
+had fled from the Golden House of the Wood beyond the World, decked
+with the faded flowers which she had wreathed about her yesterday.
+Nevertheless, so it was, that those big men eyed her intently, and
+with somewhat of worship.
+
+Now did Walter, according to her bidding, sink down on his knees
+beside her, and drawing his sword, hold it before him, as if to keep
+all interlopers aloof from the Maid.  And there was silence in the
+Mote, and all eyes were fixed on those twain.
+
+At last the old chief arose and spake:  "Ye men, here are come a man
+and a woman, we know not whence; whereas they have given word to our
+folk who first met them, that they would tell their errand to none
+save the Mote of the People; which it was their due to do, if they
+were minded to risk it.  For either they be aliens without an errand
+hither, save, it may be, to beguile us, in which case they shall
+presently die an evil death; or they have come amongst us that we
+may give them to the God with flint-edge and fire; or they have a
+message to us from some folk or other, on the issue of which lieth
+life or death.  Now shall ye hear what they have to say concerning
+themselves and their faring hither.  But, meseemeth, it shall be the
+woman who is the chief and hath the word in her mouth; for, lo you!
+the man kneeleth at her feet, as one who would serve and worship
+her.  Speak out then, woman, and let our warriors hear thee."
+
+Then the Maid lifted up her voice, and spake out clear and
+shrilling, like to a flute of the best of the minstrels:  "Ye men of
+the Children of the Bear, I would ask you a question, and let the
+chieftain who sitteth before me answer it."
+
+The old man nodded his head, and she went on:  "Tell me, Children of
+the Bear, how long a time is worn since ye saw the God of your
+worship made manifest in the body of a woman!"
+
+Said the elder:  "Many winters have worn since my father's father
+was a child, and saw the very God in the bodily form of a woman."
+
+Then she said again:  "Did ye rejoice at her coming, and would ye
+rejoice if once more she came amongst you?"
+
+"Yea," said the old chieftain, "for she gave us gifts, and learned
+us lore, and came to us in no terrible shape, but as a young woman
+as goodly as thou."
+
+Then said the Maid:  "Now, then, is the day of your gladness come;
+for the old body is dead, and I am the new body of your God, come
+amongst you for your welfare."
+
+Then fell a great silence on the Mote, till the old man spake and
+said:  "What shall I say and live?  For if thou be verily the God,
+and I threaten thee, wilt thou not destroy me?  But thou hast spoken
+a great word with a sweet mouth, and hast taken the burden of blood
+on thy lily hands; and if the Children of the Bear be befooled of
+light liars, how shall they put the shame off them?  Therefore I
+say, show to us a token; and if thou be the God, this shall be easy
+to thee; and if thou show it not, then is thy falsehood manifest,
+and thou shalt dree the weird.  For we shall deliver thee into the
+hands of these women here, who shall thrust thee down into the flow
+which is hereby, after they have wearied themselves with whipping
+thee.  But thy man that kneeleth at thy feet shall we give to the
+true God, and he shall go to her by the road of the flint and the
+fire.  Hast thou heard?  Then give to us the sign and the token."
+
+She changed countenance no whit at his word; but her eyes were the
+brighter, and her cheek the fresher and her feet moved a little, as
+if they were growing glad before the dance; and she looked out over
+the Mote, and spake in her clear voice:  "Old man, thou needest not
+to fear for thy words.  Forsooth it is not me whom thou threatenest
+with stripes and a foul death, but some light fool and liar, who is
+not here.  Now hearken!  I wot well that ye would have somewhat of
+me, to wit, that I should send you rain to end this drought, which
+otherwise seemeth like to lie long upon you:  but this rain, I must
+go into the mountains of the south to fetch it you; therefore shall
+certain of your warriors bring me on my way, with this my man, up to
+the great pass of the said mountains, and we shall set out
+thitherward this very day."
+
+She was silent a while, and all looked on her, but none spake or
+moved, so that they seemed as images of stone amongst the stones.
+
+Then she spake again and said:  "Some would say, men of the Bear,
+that this were a sign and a token great enough; but I know you, and
+how stubborn and perverse of heart ye be; and how that the gift not
+yet within your hand is no gift to you; and the wonder ye see not,
+your hearts trow not.  Therefore look ye upon me as here I stand, I
+who have come from the fairer country and the greenwood of the
+lands, and see if I bear not the summer with me, and the heart that
+maketh increase and the hand that giveth."
+
+Lo then! as she spake, the faded flowers that hung about her
+gathered life and grew fresh again; the woodbine round her neck and
+her sleek shoulders knit itself together and embraced her freshly,
+and cast its scent about her face.  The lilies that girded her loins
+lifted up their heads, and the gold of their tassels fell upon her;
+the eyebright grew clean blue again upon her smock; the eglantine
+found its blooms again, and then began to shed the leaves thereof
+upon her feet; the meadow-sweet wreathed amongst it made clear the
+sweetness of her legs, and the mouse-ear studded her raiment as with
+gems.  There she stood amidst of the blossoms, like a great orient
+pearl against the fretwork of the goldsmiths, and the breeze that
+came up the valley from behind bore the sweetness of her fragrance
+all over the Man-mote.
+
+Then, indeed, the Bears stood up, and shouted and cried, and smote
+on their shields, and tossed their spears aloft.  Then the elder
+rose from his seat, and came up humbly to where she stood, and
+prayed her to say what she would have done; while the others drew
+about in knots, but durst not come very nigh to her.  She answered
+the ancient chief, and said, that she would depart presently toward
+the mountains, whereby she might send them the rain which they
+lacked, and that thence she would away to the southward for a while;
+but that they should hear of her, or, it might be, see her, before
+they who were now of middle age should be gone to their fathers.
+
+Then the old man besought her that they might make her a litter of
+fragrant green boughs, and so bear her away toward the mountain pass
+amidst a triumph of the whole folk.  But she leapt lightly down from
+the stone, and walked to and fro on the greensward, while it seemed
+of her that her feet scarce touched the grass; and she spake to the
+ancient chief where he still kneeled in worship of her, and said
+"Nay; deemest thou of me that I need bearing by men's hands, or that
+I shall tire at all when I am doing my will, and I, the very heart
+of the year's increase?  So it is, that the going of my feet over
+your pastures shall make them to thrive, both this year and the
+coming years:  surely will I go afoot."
+
+So they worshipped her the more, and blessed her; and then first of
+all they brought meat, the daintiest they might, both for her and
+for Walter.  But they would not look on the Maid whiles she ate, or
+suffer Walter to behold her the while.  Afterwards, when they had
+eaten, some twenty men, weaponed after their fashion, made them
+ready to wend with the Maiden up into the mountains, and anon they
+set out thitherward all together.  Howbeit, the huge men held them
+ever somewhat aloof from the Maid; and when they came to the
+resting-place for that night, where was no house, for it was up
+amongst the foot-hills before the mountains, then it was a wonder to
+see how carefully they built up a sleeping-place for her, and tilted
+it over with their skin-cloaks, and how they watched nightlong about
+her.  But Walter they let sleep peacefully on the grass, a little
+way aloof from the watchers round the Maid.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX:  WALTER STRAYS IN THE PASS AND IS SUNDERED FROM THE
+MAID
+
+
+
+Morning came, and they arose and went on their ways, and went all
+day till the sun was nigh set, and they were come up into the very
+pass; and in the jaws thereof was an earthen howe.  There the Maid
+bade them stay, and she went up on to the howe, and stood there and
+spake to them, and said:  "O men of the Bear, I give you thanks for
+your following, and I bless you, and promise you the increase of the
+earth.  But now ye shall turn aback, and leave me to go my ways; and
+my man with the iron sword shall follow me.  Now, maybe, I shall
+come amongst the Bear-folk again before long, and yet again, and
+learn them wisdom; but for this time it is enough.  And I shall tell
+you that ye were best to hasten home straightway to your houses in
+the downland dales, for the weather which I have bidden for you is
+even now coming forth from the forge of storms in the heart of the
+mountains.  Now this last word I give you, that times are changed
+since I wore the last shape of God that ye have seen, wherefore a
+change I command you.  If so be aliens come amongst you, I will not
+that ye send them to me by the flint and the fire; rather, unless
+they be baleful unto you, and worthy of an evil death, ye shall
+suffer them to abide with you; ye shall make them become children of
+the Bears, if they be goodly enough and worthy, and they shall be my
+children as ye be; otherwise, if they be ill-favoured and weakling,
+let them live and be thralls to you, but not join with you, man to
+woman.  Now depart ye with my blessing."
+
+Therewith she came down from the mound, and went her ways up the
+pass so lightly, that it was to Walter, standing amongst the Bears,
+as if she had vanished away.  But the men of that folk abode
+standing and worshipping their God for a little while, and that
+while he durst not sunder him from their company.  But when they had
+blessed him and gone on their way backward, he betook him in haste
+to following the Maid, thinking to find her abiding him in some nook
+of the pass.
+
+Howsoever, it was now twilight or more, and, for all his haste, dark
+night overtook him, so that perforce he was stayed amidst the tangle
+of the mountain ways.  And, moreover, ere the night was grown old,
+the weather came upon him on the back of a great south wind, so that
+the mountain nooks rattled and roared, and there was the rain and
+the hail, with thunder and lightning, monstrous and terrible, and
+all the huge array of a summer storm.  So he was driven at last to
+crouch under a big rock and abide the day.
+
+But not so were his troubles at an end.  For under the said rock he
+fell asleep, and when he awoke it was day indeed; but as to the
+pass, the way thereby was blind with the driving rain and the
+lowering lift; so that, though he struggled as well as he might
+against the storm and the tangle, he made but little way.
+
+And now once more the thought came on him, that the Maid was of the
+fays, or of some race even mightier; and it came on him now not as
+erst, with half fear and whole desire, but with a bitter oppression
+of dread, of loss and misery; so that he began to fear that she had
+but won his love to leave him and forget him for a new-comer, after
+the wont of fay-women, as old tales tell.
+
+Two days he battled thus with storm and blindness, and wanhope of
+his life; for he was growing weak and fordone.  But the third
+morning the storm abated, though the rain yet fell heavily, and he
+could see his way somewhat as well as feel it:  withal he found that
+now his path was leading him downwards.  As it grew dusk, he came
+down into a grassy valley with a stream running through it to the
+southward, and the rain was now but little, coming down but in
+dashes from time to time.  So he crept down to the stream-side, and
+lay amongst the bushes there; and said to himself, that on the
+morrow he would get him victual, so that he might live to seek his
+Maiden through the wide world.  He was of somewhat better heart:
+but now that he was laid quiet, and had no more for that present to
+trouble him about the way, the anguish of his loss fell upon him the
+keener, and he might not refrain him from lamenting his dear Maiden
+aloud, as one who deemed himself in the empty wilderness:  and thus
+he lamented for her sweetness and her loveliness, and the kindness
+of her voice and her speech, and her mirth.  Then he fell to crying
+out concerning the beauty of her shaping, praising the parts of her
+body, as her face, and her hands, and her shoulders, and her feet,
+and cursing the evil fate which had sundered him from the
+friendliness of her, and the peerless fashion of her.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX:  NOW THEY MEET AGAIN
+
+
+
+Complaining thus-wise, he fell asleep from sheer weariness, and when
+he awoke it was broad day, calm and bright and cloudless, with the
+scent of the earth refreshed going up into the heavens, and the
+birds singing sweetly in the bushes about him:  for the dale
+whereunto he was now come was a fair and lovely place amidst the
+shelving slopes of the mountains, a paradise of the wilderness, and
+nought but pleasant and sweet things were to be seen there, now that
+the morn was so clear and sunny.
+
+He arose and looked about him, and saw where, a hundred yards aloof,
+was a thicket of small wood, as thorn and elder and whitebeam, all
+wreathed about with the bines of wayfaring tree; it hid a bight of
+the stream, which turned round about it, and betwixt it and Walter
+was the grass short and thick, and sweet, and all beset with
+flowers; and he said to himself that it was even such a place as
+wherein the angels were leading the Blessed in the great painted
+paradise in the choir of the big church at Langton on Holm.  But lo!
+as he looked he cried aloud for joy, for forth from the thicket on
+to the flowery grass came one like to an angel from out of the said
+picture, white-clad and bare-foot, sweet of flesh, with bright eyes
+and ruddy cheeks; for it was the Maid herself.  So he ran to her,
+and she abode him, holding forth kind hands to him, and smiling,
+while she wept for joy of the meeting.  He threw himself upon her,
+and spared not to kiss her, her cheeks and her mouth, and her arms
+and her shoulders, and wheresoever she would suffer it.  Till at
+last she drew aback a little, laughing on him for love, and said:
+"Forbear now, friend, for it is enough for this time, and tell me
+how thou hast sped."
+
+"Ill, ill," said he.
+
+"What ails thee?" she said.
+
+"Hunger," he said, "and longing for thee."
+
+"Well," she said, "me thou hast; there is one ill quenched; take my
+hand, and we will see to the other one."
+
+So he took her hand, and to hold it seemed to him sweet beyond
+measure.  But he looked up, and saw a little blue smoke going up
+into the air from beyond the thicket; and he laughed, for he was
+weak with hunger, and he said:  "Who is at the cooking yonder?"
+
+"Thou shalt see," she said; and led him therewith into the said
+thicket and through it, and lo! a fair little grassy place, full of
+flowers, betwixt the bushes and the bight of the stream; and on the
+little sandy ere, just off the greensward, was a fire of sticks, and
+beside it two trouts lying, fat and red-flecked.
+
+"Here is the breakfast," said she; "when it was time to wash the
+night off me e'en now, I went down the strand here into the rippling
+shallow, and saw the bank below it, where the water draws together
+yonder, and deepens, that it seemed like to hold fish; and whereas I
+looked to meet thee presently, I groped the bank for them, going
+softly; and lo thou!  Help me now, that we cook them."
+
+So they roasted them on the red embers, and fell to and ate well,
+both of them, and drank of the water of the stream out of each
+other's hollow hands; and that feast seemed glorious to them, such
+gladness went with it.
+
+But when they were done with their meat, Walter said to the Maid:
+"And how didst thou know that thou shouldst see me presently?"
+
+She said, looking on him wistfully:  "This needed no wizardry.  I
+lay not so far from thee last night, but that I heard thy voice and
+knew it."
+
+Said he, "Why didst thou not come to me then, since thou heardest me
+bemoaning thee?"
+
+She cast her eyes down, and plucked at the flowers and grass, and
+said:  "It was dear to hear thee praising me; I knew not before that
+I was so sore desired, or that thou hadst taken such note of my
+body, and found it so dear."
+
+Then she reddened sorely, and said:  "I knew not that aught of me
+had such beauty as thou didst bewail."
+
+And she wept for joy.  Then she looked on him and smiled, and said:
+"Wilt thou have the very truth of it?  I went close up to thee, and
+stood there hidden by the bushes and the night.  And amidst thy
+bewailing, I knew that thou wouldst soon fall asleep, and in sooth I
+out-waked thee."
+
+Then was she silent again; and he spake not, but looked on her
+shyly; and she said, reddening yet more:  "Furthermore, I must needs
+tell thee that I feared to go to thee in the dark night, and my
+heart so yearning towards thee."
+
+And she hung her head adown; but he said:  "Is it so indeed, that
+thou fearest me?  Then doth that make me afraid--afraid of thy nay-
+say.  For I was going to entreat thee, and say to thee:  Beloved, we
+have now gone through many troubles; let us now take a good reward
+at once, and wed together, here amidst this sweet and pleasant house
+of the mountains, ere we go further on our way; if indeed we go
+further at all.  For where shall we find any place sweeter or
+happier than this?"
+
+But she sprang up to her feet, and stood there trembling before him,
+because of her love; and she said:  "Beloved, I have deemed that it
+were good for us to go seek mankind as they live in the world, and
+to live amongst them.  And as for me, I will tell thee the sooth, to
+wit, that I long for this sorely.  For I feel afraid in the
+wilderness, and as if I needed help and protection against my
+Mistress, though she be dead; and I need the comfort of many people,
+and the throngs of the cities.  I cannot forget her:  it was but
+last night that I dreamed (I suppose as the dawn grew a-cold) that I
+was yet under her hand, and she was stripping me for the torment; so
+that I woke up panting and crying out.  I pray thee be not angry
+with me for telling thee of my desires; for if thou wouldst not have
+it so, then here will I abide with thee as thy mate, and strive to
+gather courage."
+
+He rose up and kissed her face, and said:  "Nay, I had in sooth no
+mind to abide here for ever; I meant but that we should feast a
+while here, and then depart:  sooth it is, that if thou dreadest the
+wilderness, somewhat I dread the city."
+
+She turned pale, and said:  "Thou shalt have thy will, my friend, if
+it must be so.  But bethink thee we be not yet at our journey's end,
+and may have many things and much strife to endure, before we be at
+peace and in welfare.  Now shall I tell thee--did I not before?--
+that while I am a maid untouched, my wisdom, and somedeal of might,
+abideth with me, and only so long.  Therefore I entreat thee, let us
+go now, side by side, out of this fair valley, even as we are, so
+that my wisdom and might may help thee at need.  For, my friend, I
+would not that our lives be short, so much of joy as hath now come
+into them."
+
+"Yea, beloved," he said, "let us on straightway then, and shorten
+the while that sundereth us."
+
+"Love," she said, "thou shalt pardon me one time for all.  But this
+is to be said, that I know somewhat of the haps that lie a little
+way ahead of us; partly by my lore, and partly by what I learned of
+this land of the wild folk whiles thou wert lying asleep that
+morning."
+
+So they left that pleasant place by the water, and came into the
+open valley, and went their ways through the pass; and it soon
+became stony again, as they mounted the bent which went up from out
+the dale.  And when they came to the brow of the said bent, they had
+a sight of the open country lying fair and joyous in the sunshine,
+and amidst of it, against the blue hills, the walls and towers of a
+great city.
+
+Then said the Maid:  "O, dear friend, lo you! is not that our abode
+that lieth yonder, and is so beauteous?  Dwell not our friends
+there, and our protection against uncouth wights, and mere evil
+things in guileful shapes?  O city, I bid thee hail!"
+
+But Walter looked on her, and smiled somewhat; and said:  "I rejoice
+in thy joy.  But there be evil things in yonder city also, though
+they be not fays nor devils, or it is like to no city that I wot of.
+And in every city shall foes grow up to us without rhyme or reason,
+and life therein shall be tangled unto us."
+
+"Yea," she said; "but in the wilderness amongst the devils, what was
+to be done by manly might or valiancy?  There hadst thou to fall
+back upon the guile and wizardry which I had filched from my very
+foes.  But when we come down yonder, then shall thy valiancy prevail
+to cleave the tangle for us.  Or at the least, it shall leave a tale
+of thee behind, and I shall worship thee."
+
+He laughed, and his face grew brighter:  "Mastery mows the meadow,"
+quoth he, "and one man is of little might against many.  But I
+promise thee I shall not be slothful before thee."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI:  THEY COME UPON NEW FOLK
+
+
+
+With that they went down from the bent again, and came to where the
+pass narrowed so much, that they went betwixt a steep wall of rock
+on either side; but after an hour's going, the said wall gave back
+suddenly, and, or they were ware almost, they came on another dale
+like to that which they had left, but not so fair, though it was
+grassy and well watered, and not so big either.  But here indeed
+befell a change to them; for lo! tents and pavilions pitched in the
+said valley, and amidst of it a throng of men, mostly weaponed, and
+with horses ready saddled at hand.  So they stayed their feet, and
+Walter's heart failed him, for he said to himself:  Who wotteth what
+these men may be, save that they be aliens?  It is most like that we
+shall be taken as thralls; and then, at the best, we shall be
+sundered; and that is all one with the worst.
+
+But the Maid, when she saw the horses, and the gay tents, and the
+pennons fluttering, and the glitter of spears, and gleaming of white
+armour, smote her palms together for joy, and cried out:  "Here now
+are come the folk of the city for our welcoming, and fair and lovely
+are they, and of many things shall they be thinking, and a many
+things shall they do, and we shall be partakers thereof.  Come then,
+and let us meet them, fair friend!"
+
+But Walter said:  "Alas! thou knowest not:  would that we might
+flee!  But now is it over late; so put we a good face on it, and go
+to them quietly, as erewhile we did in the Bear-country."
+
+So did they; and there sundered six from the men-at-arms and came to
+those twain, and made humble obeisance to Walter, but spake no word.
+Then they made as they would lead them to the others, and the twain
+went with them wondering, and came into the ring of men-at-arms, and
+stood before an old hoar knight, armed all, save his head, with most
+goodly armour, and he also bowed before Walter, but spake no word.
+Then they took them to the master pavilion, and made signs to them
+to sit, and they brought them dainty meat and good wine.  And the
+while of their eating arose up a stir about them; and when they were
+done with their meat, the ancient knight came to them, still bowing
+in courteous wise, and did them to wit by signs that they should
+depart:  and when they were without, they saw all the other tents
+struck, and men beginning to busy them with striking the pavilion,
+and the others mounted and ranked in good order for the road; and
+there were two horse-litters before them, wherein they were bidden
+to mount, Walter in one, and the Maid in the other, and no otherwise
+might they do.  Then presently was a horn blown, and all took to the
+road together; and Walter saw betwixt the curtains of the litter
+that men-at-arms rode on either side of him, albeit they had left
+him his sword by his side.
+
+So they went down the mountain-passes, and before sunset were gotten
+into the plain; but they made no stay for nightfall, save to eat a
+morsel and drink a draught, going through the night as men who knew
+their way well.  As they went, Walter wondered what would betide,
+and if peradventure they also would be for offering them up to their
+Gods; whereas they were aliens for certain, and belike also
+Saracens.  Moreover there was a cold fear at his heart that he
+should be sundered from the Maid, whereas their masters now were
+mighty men of war, holding in their hands that which all men desire,
+to wit, the manifest beauty of a woman.  Yet he strove to think the
+best of it that he might.  And so at last, when the night was far
+spent, and dawn was at hand, they stayed at a great and mighty gate
+in a huge wall.  There they blew loudly on the horn thrice, and
+thereafter the gates were opened, and they all passed through into a
+street, which seemed to Walter in the glimmer to be both great and
+goodly amongst the abodes of men.  Then it was but a little ere they
+came into a square, wide-spreading, one side whereof Walter took to
+be the front of a most goodly house.  There the doors of the court
+opened to them or ever the horn might blow, though, forsooth, blow
+it did loudly three times; all they entered therein, and men came to
+Walter and signed to him to alight.  So did he, and would have
+tarried to look about for the Maid, but they suffered it not, but
+led him up a huge stair into a chamber, very great, and but dimly
+lighted because of its greatness.  Then they brought him to a bed
+dight as fair as might be, and made signs to him to strip and lie
+therein.  Perforce he did so, and then they bore away his raiment,
+and left him lying there.  So he lay there quietly, deeming it no
+avail for him, a mother-naked man, to seek escape thence; but it was
+long ere he might sleep, because of his trouble of mind.  At last,
+pure weariness got the better of his hopes and fears, and he fell
+into slumber just as the dawn was passing into day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII:  OF THE NEW KING OF THE CITY AND LAND OF STARK-WALL
+
+
+
+When he awoke again the sun was shining brightly into that chamber,
+and he looked, and beheld that it was peerless of beauty and riches,
+amongst all that he had ever seen:  the ceiling done with gold and
+over-sea blue; the walls hung with arras of the fairest, though he
+might not tell what was the history done therein.  The chairs and
+stools were of carven work well be-painted, and amidmost was a great
+ivory chair under a cloth of estate, of bawdekin of gold and green,
+much be-pearled; and all the floor was of fine work alexandrine.
+
+He looked on all this, wondering what had befallen him, when lo!
+there came folk into the chamber, to wit, two serving-men well-
+bedight, and three old men clad in rich gowns of silk.  These came
+to him and (still by signs, without speech) bade him arise and come
+with them; and when he bade them look to it that he was naked, and
+laughed doubtfully, they neither laughed in answer, nor offered him
+any raiment, but still would have him arise, and he did so perforce.
+They brought him with them out of the chamber, and through certain
+passages pillared and goodly, till they came to a bath as fair as
+any might be; and there the serving-men washed him carefully and
+tenderly, the old men looking on the while.  When it was done, still
+they offered not to clothe him, but led him out, and through the
+passages again, back to the chamber.  Only this time he must pass
+between a double hedge of men, some weaponed, some in peaceful
+array, but all clad gloriously, and full chieftain-like of aspect,
+either for valiancy or wisdom.
+
+In the chamber itself was now a concourse of men, of great estate by
+deeming of their array; but all these were standing orderly in a
+ring about the ivory chair aforesaid.  Now said Walter to himself:
+Surely all this looks toward the knife and the altar for me; but he
+kept a stout countenance despite of all.
+
+So they led him up to the ivory chair, and he beheld on either side
+thereof a bench, and on each was laid a set of raiment from the
+shirt upwards; but there was much diversity betwixt these arrays.
+For one was all of robes of peace, glorious and be-gemmed, unmeet
+for any save a great king; while the other was war-weed, seemly,
+well-fashioned, but little adorned; nay rather, worn and bestained
+with weather, and the pelting of the spear-storm.
+
+Now those old men signed to Walter to take which of those raiments
+he would, and do it on.  He looked to the right and the left, and
+when he had looked on the war-gear, the heart arose in him, and he
+called to mind the array of the Goldings in the forefront of battle,
+and he made one step toward the weapons, and laid his hand thereon.
+Then ran a glad murmur through that concourse, and the old men drew
+up to him smiling and joyous, and helped him to do them on; and as
+he took up the helm, he noted that over its broad brown iron sat a
+golden crown.
+
+So when he was clad and weaponed, girt with a sword, and a steel axe
+in his hand, the elders showed him to the ivory throne, and he laid
+the axe on the arm of the chair, and drew forth the sword from the
+scabbard, and sat him down, and laid the ancient blade across his
+knees; then he looked about on those great men, and spake:  "How
+long shall we speak no word to each other, or is it so that God hath
+stricken you dumb?"
+
+Then all they cried out with one voice:  "All hail to the King, the
+King of Battle!"
+
+Spake Walter:  "If I be king, will ye do my will as I bid you?"
+
+Answered the elder:  "Nought have we will to do, lord, save as thou
+biddest."
+
+Said Walter:  "Thou then, wilt thou answer a question in all truth?"
+
+"Yea, lord," said the elder, "if I may live afterward."
+
+Then said Walter:  "The woman that came with me into your Camp of
+the Mountain, what hath befallen her?"
+
+The elder answered:  "Nought hath befallen her, either of good or
+evil, save that she hath slept and eaten and bathed her.  What,
+then, is the King's pleasure concerning her?"
+
+"That ye bring her hither to me straightway," said Walter.
+
+"Yea," said the elder; "and in what guise shall we bring her hither?
+shall she be arrayed as a servant, or a great lady?"
+
+Then Walter pondered a while, and spake at last:  "Ask her what is
+her will herein, and as she will have it, so let it be.  But set ye
+another chair beside mine, and lead her thereto.  Thou wise old man,
+send one or two to bring her in hither, but abide thou, for I have a
+question or two to ask of thee yet.  And ye, lords, abide here the
+coming of my she-fellow, if it weary you not."
+
+So the elder spake to three of the most honourable of the lords, and
+they went their ways to bring in the Maid.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII:  CONCERNING THE FASHION OF KING-MAKING IN STARK-WALL
+
+
+
+Meanwhile the King spake to the elder, and said:  "Now tell me
+whereof I am become king, and what is the fashion and cause of the
+king-making; for wondrous it is to me, whereas I am but an alien
+amidst of mighty men."
+
+"Lord," said the old man, "thou art become king of a mighty city,
+which hath under it many other cities and wide lands, and havens by
+the sea-side, and which lacketh no wealth which men desire.  Many
+wise men dwell therein, and of fools not more than in other lands.
+A valiant host shall follow thee to battle when needs must thou wend
+afield; an host not to be withstood, save by the ancient God-folk,
+if any of them were left upon the earth, as belike none are.  And as
+to the name of our said city, it hight the City of the Stark-wall,
+or more shortly, Stark-wall.  Now as to the fashion of our king-
+making:  If our king dieth and leaveth an heir male, begotten of his
+body, then is he king after him; but if he die and leave no heir,
+then send we out a great lord, with knights and sergeants, to that
+pass of the mountain whereto ye came yesterday; and the first man
+that cometh unto them, they take and lead to the city, as they did
+with thee, lord.  For we believe and trow that of old time our
+forefathers came down from the mountains by that same pass, poor and
+rude, but full of valiancy, before they conquered these lands, and
+builded the Stark-wall.  But now furthermore, when we have gotten
+the said wanderer, and brought him home to our city, we behold him
+mother-naked, all the great men of us, both sages and warriors; then
+if we find him ill-fashioned and counterfeit of his body, we roll
+him in a great carpet till he dies; or whiles, if he be but a simple
+man, and without guile, we deliver him for thrall to some artificer
+amongst us, as a shoemaker, a wright, or what not, and so forget
+him.  But in either case we make as if no such man had come to us,
+and we send again the lord and his knights to watch the pass; for we
+say that such an one the Fathers of old time have not sent us.  But
+again, when we have seen to the new-comer that he is well-fashioned
+of his body, all is not done; for we deem that never would the
+Fathers send us a dolt or a craven to be our king.  Therefore we bid
+the naked one take to him which he will of these raiments, either
+the ancient armour, which now thou bearest, lord, or this golden
+raiment here; and if he take the war-gear, as thou takedst it, King,
+it is well; but if he take the raiment of peace, then hath he the
+choice either to be thrall of some goodman of the city, or to be
+proven how wise he may be, and so fare the narrow edge betwixt death
+and kingship; for if he fall short of his wisdom, then shall he die
+the death.  Thus is thy question answered, King, and praise be to
+the Fathers that they have sent us one whom none may doubt, either
+for wisdom or valiancy."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV:  NOW COMETH THE MAID TO THE KING
+
+
+
+Then all they bowed before the King, and he spake again:  "What is
+that noise that I hear without, as if it were the rising of the sea
+on a sandy shore, when the south-west wind is blowing."
+
+Then the elder opened his mouth to answer; but before he might get
+out the word, there was a stir without the chamber door, and the
+throng parted, and lo! amidst of them came the Maid, and she yet
+clad in nought save the white coat wherewith she had won through the
+wilderness, save that on her head was a garland of red roses, and
+her middle was wreathed with the same.  Fresh and fair she was as
+the dawn of June; her face bright, red-lipped, and clear-eyed, and
+her cheeks flushed with hope and love.  She went straight to Walter
+where he sat, and lightly put away with her hand the elder who would
+lead her to the ivory throne beside the King; but she knelt down
+before him, and laid her hand on his steel-clad knee, and said:  "O
+my lord, now I see that thou hast beguiled me, and that thou wert
+all along a king-born man coming home to thy realm.  But so dear
+thou hast been to me; and so fair and clear, and so kind withal do
+thine eyes shine on me from under the grey war-helm, that I will
+beseech thee not to cast me out utterly, but suffer me to be thy
+servant and handmaid for a while.  Wilt thou not?"
+
+But the King stooped down to her and raised her up, and stood on his
+feet, and took her hands and kissed them, and set her down beside
+him, and said to her:  "Sweetheart, this is now thy place till the
+night cometh, even by my side."
+
+So she sat down there meek and valiant, her hands laid in her lap,
+and her feet one over the other; while the King said:  "Lords, this
+is my beloved, and my spouse.  Now, therefore, if ye will have me
+for King, ye must worship this one for Queen and Lady; or else
+suffer us both to go our ways in peace."
+
+Then all they that were in the chamber cried out aloud:  "The Queen,
+the Lady!  The beloved of our lord!"
+
+And this cry came from their hearts, and not their lips only; for as
+they looked on her, and the brightness of her beauty, they saw also
+the meekness of her demeanour, and the high heart of her, and they
+all fell to loving her.  But the young men of them, their cheeks
+flushed as they beheld her, and their hearts went out to her, and
+they drew their swords and brandished them aloft, and cried out for
+her as men made suddenly drunk with love:  "The Queen, the Lady, the
+lovely one!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV:  OF THE KING OF STARK-WALL AND HIS QUEEN
+
+
+
+But while this betid, that murmur without, which is aforesaid, grew
+louder; and it smote on the King's ear, and he said again to the
+elder:  "Tell us now of that noise withoutward, what is it?"
+
+Said the elder:  "If thou, King, and the Queen, wilt but arise and
+stand in the window, and go forth into the hanging gallery thereof,
+then shall ye know at once what is this rumour, and therewithal
+shall ye see a sight meet to rejoice the heart of a king new come
+into kingship."
+
+So the King arose and took the Maid by the hand, and went to the
+window and looked forth; and lo! the great square of the place all
+thronged with folk as thick as they could stand, and the more part
+of the carles with a weapon in hand, and many armed right gallantly.
+Then he went out into the gallery with his Queen, still holding her
+hand, and his lords and wise men stood behind him.  Straightway then
+arose a cry, and a shout of joy and welcome that rent the very
+heavens, and the great place was all glittering and strange with the
+tossing up of spears and the brandishing of swords, and the
+stretching forth of hands.
+
+But the Maid spake softly to King Walter and said:  "Here then is
+the wilderness left behind a long way, and here is warding and
+protection against the foes of our life and soul.  O blessed be thou
+and thy valiant heart!"
+
+But Walter spake nothing, but stood as one in a dream; and yet, if
+that might be, his longing toward her increased manifold.
+
+But down below, amidst of the throng, stood two neighbours somewhat
+anigh to the window; and quoth one to the other:  "See thou! the new
+man in the ancient armour of the Battle of the Waters, bearing the
+sword that slew the foeman king on the Day of the Doubtful Onset!
+Surely this is a sign of good-luck to us all."
+
+"Yea," said the second, "he beareth his armour well, and the eyes
+are bright in the head of him:  but hast thou beheld well his she-
+fellow, and what the like of her is?"
+
+"I see her," said the other, "that she is a fair woman; yet somewhat
+worse clad than simply.  She is in her smock, man, and were it not
+for the balusters I deem ye should see her barefoot.  What is amiss
+with her?"
+
+"Dost thou not see her," said the second neighbour, "that she is not
+only a fair woman, but yet more, one of those lovely ones that draw
+the heart out of a man's body, one may scarce say for why?  Surely
+Stark-wall hath cast a lucky net this time.  And as to her raiment,
+I see of her that she is clad in white and wreathed with roses, but
+that the flesh of her is so wholly pure and sweet that it maketh all
+her attire but a part of her body, and halloweth it, so that it hath
+the semblance of gems.  Alas, my friend! let us hope that this Queen
+will fare abroad unseldom amongst the people."
+
+Thus, then, they spake; but after a while the King and his mate went
+back into the chamber, and he gave command that the women of the
+Queen should come and fetch her away, to attire her in royal array.
+And thither came the fairest of the honourable damsels, and were
+fain of being her waiting-women.  Therewithal the King was unarmed,
+and dight most gloriously, but still he bore the Sword of the King's
+Slaying:  and sithence were the King and the Queen brought into the
+great hall of the palace, and they met on the dais, and kissed
+before the lords and other folk that thronged the hall.  There they
+ate a morsel and drank a cup together while all beheld them; and
+then they were brought forth, and a white horse of the goodliest,
+well bedight, brought for each of them, and thereon they mounted and
+went their ways together, by the lane which the huge throng made for
+them, to the great church, for the hallowing and the crowning; and
+they were led by one squire alone, and he unarmed; for such was the
+custom of Stark-wall when a new king should be hallowed:  so came
+they to the great church (for that folk was not miscreant, so to
+say), and they entered it, they two alone, and went into the choir:
+and when they had stood there a little while wondering at their lot,
+they heard how the bells fell a-ringing tunefully over their heads;
+and then drew near the sound of many trumpets blowing together, and
+thereafter the voices of many folk singing; and then were the great
+doors thrown open, and the bishop and his priests came into the
+church with singing and minstrelsy, and thereafter came the whole
+throng of the folk, and presently the nave of the church was filled
+by it, as when the water follows the cutting of the dam, and fills
+up the dyke.  Thereafter came the bishop and his mates into the
+choir, and came up to the King, and gave him and the Queen the kiss
+of peace.  This was mass sung gloriously; and thereafter was the
+King anointed and crowned, and great joy was made throughout the
+church.  Afterwards they went back afoot to the palace, they two
+alone together, with none but the esquire going before to show them
+the way.  And as they went, they passed close beside those two
+neighbours, whose talk has been told of afore, and the first one, he
+who had praised the King's war-array, spake and said:  "Truly,
+neighbour, thou art in the right of it; and now the Queen has been
+dight duly, and hath a crown on her head, and is clad in white
+samite done all over with pearls, I see her to be of exceeding
+goodliness; as goodly, maybe, as the Lord King."
+
+Quoth the other:  "Unto me she seemeth as she did e'en now; she is
+clad in white, as then she was, and it is by reason of the pure and
+sweet flesh of her that the pearls shine out and glow, and by the
+holiness of her body is her rich attire hallowed; but, forsooth, it
+seemed to me as she went past as though paradise had come anigh to
+our city, and that all the air breathed of it.  So I say, praise be
+to God and His Hallows who hath suffered her to dwell amongst us!"
+
+Said the first man:  "Forsooth, it is well; but knowest thou at all
+whence she cometh, and of what lineage she may be?"
+
+"Nay," said the other, "I wot not whence she is; but this I wot full
+surely, that when she goeth away, they whom she leadeth with her
+shall be well bestead.  Again, of her lineage nought know I; but
+this I know, that they that come of her, to the twentieth
+generation, shall bless and praise the memory of her, and hallow her
+name little less than they hallow the name of the Mother of God."
+
+So spake those two; but the King and Queen came back to the palace,
+and sat among the lords and at the banquet which was held
+thereafter, and long was the time of their glory, till the night was
+far spent and all men must seek to their beds.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI:  OF WALTER AND THE MAID IN THE DAYS OF THE KINGSHIP
+
+
+
+Long it was, indeed, till the women, by the King's command, had
+brought the Maid to the King's chamber; and he met her, and took her
+by the shoulders and kissed her, and said:  "Art thou not weary,
+sweetheart?  Doth not the city, and the thronging folk, and the
+watching eyes of the great ones . . . doth it not all lie heavy on
+thee, as it doth upon me?"
+
+She said:  "And where is the city now? is not this the wilderness
+again, and thou and I alone together therein?"
+
+He gazed at her eagerly, and she reddened, so that her eyes shone
+light amidst the darkness of the flush of her cheeks.
+
+He spake trembling and softly, and said:  "Is it not in one matter
+better than the wilderness? is not the fear gone, yea, every whit
+thereof?"
+
+The dark flush had left her face, and she looked on him exceeding
+sweetly, and spoke steadily and clearly:  "Even so it is, beloved."
+Therewith she set her hand to the girdle that girt her loins, and
+did it off, and held it out toward him, and said:  "Here is the
+token; this is a maid's girdle, and the woman is ungirt."
+
+So he took the girdle and her hand withal, and cast his arms about
+her:  and amidst the sweetness of their love and their safety, and
+assured hope of many days of joy, they spake together of the hours
+when they fared the razor-edge betwixt guile and misery and death,
+and the sweeter yet it grew to them because of it; and many things
+she told him ere the dawn, of the evil days bygone, and the dealings
+of the Mistress with her, till the grey day stole into the chamber
+to make manifest her loveliness; which, forsooth, was better even
+than the deeming of that man amidst the throng whose heart had been
+so drawn towards her.  So they rejoiced together in the new day.
+
+But when the full day was, and Walter arose, he called his thanes
+and wise men to the council; and first he bade open the prison-
+doors, and feed the needy and clothe them, and make good cheer to
+all men, high and low, rich and unrich; and thereafter he took
+counsel with them on many matters, and they marvelled at his wisdom
+and the keenness of his wit; and so it was, that some were but half
+pleased thereat, whereas they saw that their will was like to give
+way before his in all matters.  But the wiser of them rejoiced in
+him, and looked for good days while his life lasted.
+
+Now of the deeds that he did, and his joys and his griefs, the tale
+shall tell no more; nor of how he saw Langton again, and his
+dealings there.
+
+In Stark-wall he dwelt, and reigned a King, well beloved of his
+folk, sorely feared of their foemen.  Strife he had to deal with, at
+home and abroad; but therein he was not quelled, till he fell asleep
+fair and softly, when this world had no more of deeds for him to do.
+Nor may it be said that the needy lamented him; for no needy had he
+left in his own land.  And few foes he left behind to hate him.
+
+As to the Maid, she so waxed in loveliness and kindness, that it was
+a year's joy for any to have cast eyes upon her in street or on
+field.  All wizardry left her since the day of her wedding; yet of
+wit and wisdom she had enough left, and to spare; for she needed no
+going about, and no guile, any more than hard commands, to have her
+will done.  So loved she was by all folk, forsooth, that it was a
+mere joy for any to go about her errands.  To be short, she was the
+land's increase, and the city's safeguard, and the bliss of the
+folk.
+
+Somewhat, as the days passed, it misgave her that she had beguiled
+the Bear-folk to deem her their God; and she considered and thought
+how she might atone it.
+
+So the second year after they had come to Stark-wall, she went with
+certain folk to the head of the pass that led down to the Bears; and
+there she stayed the men-at-arms, and went on further with a two
+score of husbandmen whom she had redeemed from thralldom in Stark-
+wall; and when they were hard on the dales of the Bears, she left
+them there in a certain little dale, with their wains and horses,
+and seed-corn, and iron tools, and went down all bird-alone to the
+dwelling of those huge men, unguarded now by sorcery, and trusting
+in nought but her loveliness and kindness.  Clad she was now, as
+when she fled from the Wood beyond the World, in a short white coat
+alone, with bare feet and naked arms; but the said coat was now
+embroidered with the imagery of blossoms in silk and gold, and gems,
+whereas now her wizardry had departed from her.
+
+So she came to the Bears, and they knew her at once, and worshipped
+and blessed her, and feared her.  But she told them that she had a
+gift for them, and was come to give it; and therewith she told them
+of the art of tillage, and bade them learn it; and when they asked
+her how they should do so, she told them of the men who were abiding
+them in the mountain dale, and bade the Bears take them for their
+brothers and sons of the ancient Fathers, and then they should be
+taught of them.  This they behight her to do, and so she led them to
+where her freedmen lay, whom the Bears received with all joy and
+loving-kindness, and took them into their folk.
+
+So they went back to their dales together; but the Maid went her
+ways back to her men-at-arms and the city of Stark-wall.
+
+Thereafter she sent more gifts and messages to the Bears, but never
+again went herself to see them; for as good a face as she put on it
+that last time, yet her heart waxed cold with fear, and it almost
+seemed to her that her Mistress was alive again, and that she was
+escaping from her and plotting against her once more.
+
+As for the Bears, they throve and multiplied; till at last strife
+arose great and grim betwixt them and other peoples; for they had
+become mighty in battle:  yea, once and again they met the host of
+Stark-wall in fight, and overthrew and were overthrown.  But that
+was a long while after the Maid had passed away.
+
+Now of Walter and the Maid is no more to be told, saving that they
+begat between them goodly sons and fair daughters; whereof came a
+great lineage in Stark-wall; which lineage was so strong, and
+endured so long a while, that by then it had died out, folk had
+clean forgotten their ancient Custom of king-making, so that after
+Walter of Langton there was never another king that came down to
+them poor and lonely from out of the Mountains of the Bears.
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg eText The Wood Beyond the World
+
diff --git a/old/wbydw10.zip b/old/wbydw10.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e9eddc8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/wbydw10.zip