The Wood Beyond the World by William Morris (novel24 txt) 📖

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