"well, my friend, after we had lived thus a long time, we set out one day to seek to the well at the world's end, each of us signed and marked out for the quest by bearing such-like beads as thou and i both bear upon our necks today. once again of all that befell us on that quest i will tell thee naught as now: because to that well have i to bring thee: though myself, belike, i need not its waters again."
quoth ralph: "and must thou lead me thy very self, mayest thou not abide in some safe place my going and returning? so many and sore as the toils and perils of the way may be." "what!" she said, "and how shall i be sundered from thee now i have found thee? yea, and who shall lead thee, thou lovely boy? shall it be a man to bewray thee, or a woman to bewray me? yet need we not go tomorrow, my beloved, nor for many days: so sweet as we are to each other.
"but in those past days it was needs must we begin our quest before the burden of years was over heavy upon us. shortly to say it, we found the well, and drank of its waters after abundant toil and peril, as thou mayst well deem. then the life and the soul came back to us, and the past years were as naught to us, and my youth was renewed in me, and i became as thou seest me to-day. but my fellow was as a woman of forty summers again, strong and fair as i had seen her when she came into the garden in the days of my queenhood, and thus we returned to the house of the sorceress, and rested there for a little from our travel and our joy.
"at last, and that was but some five years ago, the teacher said to me: 'sister, i have learned thee all that thine heart can take of me, and thou art strong in wisdom, and moreover again shall it be with thee, as i told of thee long ago, that no man shall look on thee that shall not love thee. now i will not seek to see thy life that is coming, nor what thine end shall be, for that should belike be grievous to both of us; but this i see of thee, that thou wilt now guide thy life not as i will, but as thou wilt; and since my way is not thy way, and that i see thou shalt not long abide alone, now shall we sunder; for i am minded to go to the most ancient parts of the world, and seek all the innermost of wisdom whiles i yet live; but with kings and champions and the cities of folk will i have no more to do: while thou shalt not be able to refrain from these. so now i bid thee farewell.'
"i wept at her words, but gainsaid them naught, for i wotted that she spake but the truth; so i kissed her, and we parted; she went her ways through the wildwood, and i abode at the house of the sorceress, and waited on the wearing of the days.
"but scarce a month after her departure, as i stood by the threshold one morning amidst of the goats, i saw men come riding from out the wood; so i abode them, and they came to the gate of the garth and there lighted down from their horses, and they were three in company; and no one of them was young, and one was old, with white locks flowing down from under his helm: for they were all armed in knightly fashion, but they had naught but white gaberdines over their hauberks, with no coat-armour or token upon them. so they came through the garth-gate and i greeted them and asked them what they would; then the old man knelt down on the grass before me and said: 'if i were as young as i am old my heart would fail me in beholding thy beauty: but now i will ask thee somewhat: far away beyond the forest we heard rumours of a woman dwelling in the uttermost desert, who had drunk of the well at the world's end, and was wise beyond measure. now we have set ourselves to seek that woman, and if thou be she, we would ask a question of thy wisdom.'
"i answered that i was even such as they had heard of, and bade them ask.
"said the old man:
"'fifty years ago, when i was yet but a young man, there was a fair woman who was queen of the land of the tower and whom we loved sorely because we had dwelt together with her amidst tribulation in the desert and the wildwood: and we are not of her people, but a fellowship of free men and champions hight the men of the dry tree: and we hoped that she would one day come back and dwell with us and be our lady and queen: and indeed trouble seemed drawing anigh her, so that we might help her and she might become our fellow again, when lo! she vanished away from the folk and none knew where she was gone. therefore a band of us of the dry tree swore an oath together to seek her till we found her, that we might live and die together: but of that band of one score and one, am i the last one left that seeketh; for the rest are dead, or sick, or departed: and indeed i was the youngest of them. but for these two men, they are my sons whom i have bred in the knowledge of these things and in the hope of finding tidings of our lady and queen, if it were but the place where her body lieth. thou art wise: knowest thou the resting place of her bones?"
"when i had heard the tale of the old man i was moved to my inmost heart, and i scarce knew what to say. but now this long while fear was dead in me, so i thought i would tell the very sooth: but i said first: 'sir, what i will tell, i will tell without beseeching, so i pray thee stand up.' so did he, and i said: 'geoffrey, what became of the white hind after the banners had left the wildwood'? he stared wild at me, and i deemed that tears began to come into his eyes; but i said again: 'what betid to dame joyce's youngest born, the fair little maiden that we left sick of a fever when we rode to up-castle?' still he said naught but looked at me wondering: and said: 'hast thou ever again seen that great old oak nigh the clearing by the water, the half of which fell away in the summer-storm of that last july?'
"then verily the tears gushed out of his eyes, and he wept, for as old as he was; and when he could master himself he said: 'who art thou? who art thou? art thou the daughter of my lady, even as these are my sons?' but i said: 'now will i answer thy first question, and tell thee that the lady thou seekest is verily alive; and she has thriven, for she has drunk of the well at the world's end, and has put from her the burden of the years. o geoffrey, and dost thou not know me?' and i held out my hand to him, and i also was weeping, because of my thought of the years gone by; for this old man had been that swain who had nigh died for me when i fled with my husband from the old king; and he became one of the dry tree, and had followed me with kind service about the woods in the days when i was at my happiest.
"but now he fell on his knees before me not like a vassal but like a lover, and kissed my feet, and was beside himself for joy. and his sons, who were men of some forty summers, tall and warrior-like, kissed my hands and made obeisance before me.
"now when we had come to ourselves again, old geoffrey, who was now naught but glad, spake and said: 'it is told amongst us that when our host departed from the land of the tower, after thou hadst taken thy due seat upon the throne, that thou didst promise our chieftains how thou wouldst one day come back to the fellowship of the dry tree and dwell amongst us. wilt thou now hold to thy promise?' i said: 'o geoffrey, if thou art the last of those seekers, and thou wert but a boy when i dwelt with you of old, who of the dry tree is left to remember me?' he hung his head awhile then, and spake: 'old are we grown, yet art thou fittest to be amongst young folk: unless mine eyes are beguiled by some semblance which will pass away presently.' 'nay,' quoth i, 'it is not so; as i am now, so shall i be for many and many a day.' 'well,' said geoffrey, 'wherever thou mayst be, thou shalt be queen of men.'
"'i list not to be queen again,' said i. he laughed and said: 'i wot not how thou mayst help it.'
"i said: 'tell me of the dry tree, how the champions have sped, and have they grown greater or less.' said he: 'they are warriors and champions from father to son; therefore have they thriven not over well; yet they have left the thick of the wood, and built them a great castle above the little town hight hampton; so that is now called hampton under scaur, for upon the height of the said scaur is our castle builded: and there we hold us against the burg of the four friths which hath thriven greatly; there is none so great as the burg in all the lands about.'
"i said: 'and the land of the tower, thriveth the folk thereof at all?' 'nay,' he said, 'they have been rent to pieces by folly and war and greediness: in the great city are but few people, grass grows in its streets; the merchants wend not the ways that lead thither. naught thriveth there since thou stolest thyself away from them.'
"'nay,' i said, 'i fled from their malice, lest i should have been brought out to be burned once more; and there would have been none to rescue then.' 'was it so?' said old geoffrey; 'well it is all one now; their day is done.'
"'well,' i said, 'come into my house, and eat and drink therein and sleep here to-night, and to-morrow i shall tell thee what i will do.'
"even so they did; and on the morrow early i spake to geoffrey and said: 'what hath befallen the land of abundance, and the castle my lord built for me there; which we held as our refuge all through the war of the tower, both before we joined us to you in the wildwood, and afterwards?' he said: 'it is at peace still; no one hath laid hand on it; there is a simple folk dwelling there in the clearing of the wood, which forgetteth thee not; though forsooth strange tales are told of thee there; and the old men deem that it is but a little since thou hast ceased to come and go there; and they are ready to worship thee as somewhat more than the blessed saints, were it not for the fathers of the thorn who are their masters.'
"i pondered this a while, and then said: 'geoffrey, ye shall bring me hence away to the peopled parts, and on the way, or when we are come amongst the cities and the kingdoms, we will settle it whither i shall go. see thou! i were fain to be of the brotherhood of the dry tree; yet i deem it will scarce be that i shall go and dwell there straightway.'
"therewith the old man seemed content; and indeed now that the first joy of our meeting, when his youth sprang up in him once more, was over, he found it hard to talk freely with me, and was downcast and shy before me, as if something had come betwixt us, which had made our lives cold to each other.
"so that day we left the house of the sorceress, which i shall not see again, till i come there hand in hand with thee, beloved. when we came to the peopled parts, geoffrey and his sons brought me to the land of abundance, and i found it all as he had said to me: and i took up my dwelling in the castle, and despised not those few folk of the land, but was kind to them: but though they praised my gifts, and honoured me as the saints are honoured, and though they loved me, yet it was with fear, so that i had little part with them. there i dwelt then; and the book which thou didst read there, part true and part false, and altogether of malice against me, i bought of a monk who came our way, and who at first was sore afeared when he found that he had come to my castle. as to the halling of the chamber of dais, i have told thee before how my lord, the king's son, did do make it in memory of the wilderness wherein he found me, and the life of thralldom from which he brought me. there i dwelt till nigh upon these days in peace and quiet: not did i go to the dry tree for a long while, though many of them sought to me there at the castle of abundance; and, woe worth the while! there was oftenest but one end to their guesting, that of all gifts, they besought me but of one, which, alack! i might not give them: and that is the love that i have given to thee, beloved.—and, oh! my fear, that it will weigh too light with thee, to win me pardon of thee for all that thou must needs pardon me, ere thou canst give me all thy love, that i long for so sorely."
