CHAPTER IV. FACE-OF-GOD FARETH TO THE WOOD AGAIN.
WHEN it was the earliest morning and dawn was but just beginning,Face-of-god awoke and rose up from his bed, and came forth into the hallnaked in his shirt, and stood by the hearth, wherein the piled-up emberswere yet red, and looked about and could see nothing stirring in thedimness: then he fetched water and washed the night-tide off him, andclad himself in haste, and was even as he was yesterday, save that heleft his bow and quiver in their place and took instead a shortcasting-spear; moreover he took a leathern scrip and went therewith tothe buttery, and set therein bread and flesh and a little gilded beaker;and all this he did with but little noise; for he would not bequestioned, lest he should have to answer himself as well as others.
Thus he went quietly out of doors, for the door was but latched, since nobolts or bars or locks were used in Burgstead, and through the town-gate,which stood open, save when rumours of war were about. He turned hisface straight towards Wildlake’s Way, walking briskly, but at whileslooking back over his shoulder toward the East to note what way was madeby the dawning, and how the sky lightened above the mountain passes.
By then he was come to the place where the Maiden Ward was held in thesummer the dawn was so far forward that all things had their due colours,and were clear to see in the shadowless day. It was a bright morning,with an easterly air stirring that drave away the haze and dried themeadows, which had otherwise been rimy; for it was cold. Gold-manelingered on the place a little, and his eyes fell on the road, as dustyyet as in Redesman’s song; for the autumn had been very dry, and thestrip of green that edged the outside of the way was worn and dusty also.On the edge of it, half in the dusty road, half on the worn grass, was along twine of briony red-berried and black-leaved; and right in the midstof the road were two twigs of great-leaved sturdy pollard oak, as thoughthey had been thrown aside there yesterday by women or childrena-sporting; and the deep white dust yet held the marks of feet, somebare, some shod, crossing each other here and there. Face-of-god smiledas he passed on, as a man with a happy thought; for his mind showed him apicture of the Bride as she would be leading the Maiden Ward next summer,and singing first among the singers, and he saw her as clearly as he hadoften seen her verily, and before him was the fashion of her hands andall her body, and the little mark on her right wrist, and the place whereher arm whitened, because the sleeve guarded it against the sun, whichhad long been pleasant unto him, and the little hollow in her chin, andthe lock of red-brown hair waving in the wind above her brow, and shiningin the sun as brightly as the Alderman’s cunningest work of golden wire.Soft and sweet seemed that picture, till he almost seemed to hear hersweet voice calling to him, and desire of her so took hold of the youth,that it stirred him up to go swiftlier as he strode on, the daybrightening behind him.
Now was it nigh sunrise, and he began to meet folk on the way, though notmany; since for most their way lay afield, and not towards the Burg. Thefirst was a Woodlander, tall and gaunt, striding beside his ass, whosepanniers were laden with charcoal. The carle’s daughter, a little maidenof seven winters, riding on the ass’s back betwixt the panniers, andprattling to herself in the cold morning; for she was pleased with theclear light in the east, and the smooth wide turf of the meadows, as onewho had not often been far from the shadow of the heavy trees of thewood, and their dark wall round about the clearing where they dwelt.Face-of-god gave the twain the sele of the day in merry fashion as hepassed them by, and the sober dark-faced man nodded to him but spake noword, and the child stayed her prattle to watch him as he went by.
Then came the sound of the rattle of wheels, and, as he doubled an angleof the rock-wall, he came upon a wain drawn by four dun kine, wherein laya young woman all muffled up against the cold with furs and cloths;beside the yoke-beasts went her man, a well-knit trim-faced Dalesman cladbravely in holiday raiment, girt with a goodly sword, bearing a brightsteel helm on his head, in his hand a long spear with a gay red and whiteshaft done about with copper bands. He looked merry and proud of hiswain-load, and the woman was smiling kindly on him from out of herscarlet and fur; but now she turned a weary happy face on Gold-mane, forthey knew him, as did all men of the Dale.
So he stopped when they met, for the goodman had already stayed his slowbeasts, and the goodwife had risen a little on her cushions to greet him,yet slowly and but a little, for she was great with child, and not farfrom her time. That knew Gold-mane well, and what was toward, and whythe goodman wore his fine clothes, and why the wain was decked withoak-boughs and the yoke-beasts with their best gilded bells andcopper-adorned harness. For it was a custom with many of the kindredsthat the goodwife should fare to her father’s house to lie in with herfirst babe, and the day of her coming home was made a great feast in thehouse. So then Face-of-god cried out: ‘Hail to thee, O Warcliff! Shrewdis the wind this morning, and thou dost well to heed it carefully, thisthine orchard, this thy garden, this thy fair apple-tree! To a good hallthou wendest, and the Wine of Increase shall be sweet there this even.’
Then smiled Warcliff all across his face, and the goodwife hung her headand reddened. Said the goodman: ‘Wilt thou not be with us, son of theAlderman, as surely thy father shall be?’
‘Nay,’ said Face-of-god, ‘though I were fain of it: my own matters carryme away.’
‘What matters?’ said Warcliff; ‘perchance thou art for the cities thisautumn?’
Face-of-god answered somewhat stiffly: ‘Nay, I am not;’ and then morekindly, and smiling, ‘All roads lead not down to the Plain, friend.’
‘What road then farest thou away from us?’ said the goodwife.
‘The way of my will,’ he answered.
‘And what way is that?’ said she; ‘take heed, lest I get a longing toknow. For then must thou needs tell me, or deal with the carle therebeside thee.’
‘Nay, goodwife,’ said Face-of-god, ‘let not that longing take thee; foron that matter I am even as wise as thou. Now good speed to thee and tothe new-comer!’
Therewith he went close up to the wain, and reached out his hand to her,and she gave him hers and he kissed it, and so went his ways smilingkindly on them. Then the carle cried to his kine, and they bent downtheir heads to the yoke; and presently, as he walked on, he heard therumble of the wain mingling with the tinkling of their bells, which in alittle while became measured and musical, and sounded above the creakingof the axles and the rattle of the gear and the roll of the great wheelsover the road: and so it grew thinner and thinner till it all died awaybehind him.
He was now come to where the river turned away from the sheer rock-wall,which was not so high there as in most other places, as there had been inold time long screes from the cliff, which had now grown together, withthe waxing of herbs and the washing down of the earth on to them, andmade a steady slope or low hill going down riverward. Over this the roadlifted itself above the level of the meadows, keeping a little way fromthe cliffs, while on the other side its bank was somewhat broken andsteep here and there. As Face-of-god came up to one of these brokenplaces, the sun rose over the eastern pass, and the meadows grew goldenwith its long beams. He lingered, and looked back under his hand, and ashe did so heard the voices and laughter of women coming up from the slopebelow him, and presently a young woman came struggling up the broken bankwith hand and knee, and cast herself down on the roadside turf laughingand panting. She was a long-limbed light-made woman, dark-faced andblack-haired: amidst her laughter she looked up and saw Gold-mane, whohad stopped at once when he saw her; she held out her hands to him, andsaid lightly, though her face flushed withal:
‘Come hither, thou, and help the others to climb the bank; for they arebeaten in the race, and now must they do after my will; that was theforfeit.’
He went up to her, and took her hands and kissed them, as was the customof the Dale, and said:
‘Hail to thee, Long-coat! who be they, and whither away this morningearly?’
She looked hard at him, and fondly bel
ike, as she answered slowly: ‘Theybe the two maidens of my father’s house, whom thou knowest; and ourerrand, all three of us, is to Burgstead, the Feast of the Wine ofIncrease which shall be drunk this even.’
As she spake came another woman half up the bank, to whom wentFace-of-god, and, taking her hands, drew her up while she laughed merrilyin his face: he saluted her as he had Long-coat, and then with a laughturned about to wait for the third; who came indeed, but after a littlewhile, for she had abided, hearing their voices. Her also Gold-mane drewup, and kissed her hands, and she lay on the grass by Long-coat, but thesecond maiden stood up beside the young man. She was white-skinned andgolden-haired, a very fair damsel, whereas the last-comer was but comely,as were well-nigh all the women of the Dale.
Said Face-of-god, looking on the three: ‘How comes it, maidens, that yeare but in your kirtles this sharp autumn morning? or where have ye leftyour gowns or your cloaks?’
For indeed they were clad but in close-fitting blue kirtles of fine wool,embroidered about the hems with gold and coloured threads.
The last-comer laughed and said: ‘What ails thee, Gold-mane, to be socareful of us, as if thou wert our mother or our nurse? Yet if thou mustneeds know, there hang our gowns on the thorn-bush down yonder; for wehave been running a match and a forfeit; to wit, that she who was last onthe highway should go down again and bring them up all three; and nowthat is my day’s work: but since thou art here, Alderman’s son, thoushalt go down instead of me and fetch them up.’
But he laughed merrily and outright, and said: ‘That will I not, forthere be but twenty-four hours in the day, and what between eating anddrinking and talking to fair maidens, I have enough to do in every one ofthem. Wasteful are ye women, and simple is your forfeit. Now will I,who am the Alderman’s son, give forth a doom, and will ordain that one ofyou fetch up the gowns yourselves, and that Long-coat be the one; for sheis the fleetest-footed and ablest thereto. Will ye take my doom? forlater on I shall not be wiser.’
‘Yea,’ said the fair woman, ‘not because thou art the Alderman’s son, butbecause thou art the fairest man of the Dale, and mayst bid us poor soulswhat thou wilt.’
Face-of-god reddened at her words, and the speaker and the last-comerlaughed; but Long-coat held her peace: she cast one very sober look onhim, and then ran lightly down the bent; he drew near the edge of it, andwatched her going; for her light-foot slimness was fair to look on: andhe noted that when she was nigh the thorn-bush whereon hung thebright-broidered gowns, and deemed belike that she was not seen, shekissed both her hands where he had kissed them erst.
Thereat he drew aback and turned away shyly, scarce looking at the othertwain, who smiled on him with somewhat jeering looks; but he bade themfarewell and departed speedily; and if they spoke, it was but softly, forhe heard their voices no more.
He went on under the sunlight which was now gilding the outstandingstones of the cliffs, and still his mind was set upon the Bride; and hismeeting with the mother of the yet unborn baby, and with the three womenwith their freshness and fairness, did somehow turn his thought the moreupon her, since she was the woman who was to be his amongst all women,for she was far fairer than any one of them; and through all manner oflife and through all kinds of deeds would he be with her, and know moreof her fairness and kindness than any other could: and him-seemed hecould see pictures of her and of him amidst all these deeds and ways.
Now he went very swiftly; for he was eager, though he knew not for what,and he thought but little of the things on which his eyes fell. He metnone else on the road till he was come to Wildlake’s Way, though he sawfolk enough down in the meadows; he was soon amidst the first of thetrees, and without making any stay set his face east and somewhat north,that is, toward the slopes that led to the great mountains. He said tohimself aloud, as he wended the wood: ‘Strange! yestereven I thought muchof the wood, and I set my mind on not going thither, and this morning Ithought nothing of it, and here am I amidst its trees, and wendingtowards its innermost.’
His way was easy at first, because the wood for a little space was all ofbeech, so that there was no undergrowth, and he went lightly betwixt thetall grey and smooth boles; albeit his heart was nought so gay as it wasin the dale amidst the sunshine. After a while the beech-wood grewthinner, and at last gave out altogether, and he came into a space ofrough broken ground with nought but a few scrubby oaks and thorn-bushesgrowing thereon here and there. The sun was high in the heavens now, andshone brightly down on the waste, though there were a few white cloudshigh up above him. The rabbits scuttled out of the grass before him;here and there he turned aside from a stone on which lay coiled an addersunning itself; now and again both hart and hind bounded away from beforehim, or a sounder of wild swine ran grunting away toward closer covert.But nought did he see but the common sights and sounds of the woodland;nor did he look for aught else, for he knew this part of the woodlandindifferent well.
He held on over this treeless waste for an hour or more, when the groundbegan to be less rugged, and he came upon trees again, but thinlyscattered, oak and ash and hornbeam not right great, with thickets ofholly and blackthorn between them. The set of the ground was stillsteadily up to the east and north-east, and he followed it as one whowendeth an assured way. At last before him seemed to rise a wall oftrees and thicket; but when he drew near to it, lo! an opening in acertain place, and a little path as if men were wont to thread the tangleof the wood thereby; though hitherto he had noted no slot of men, nor anysign of them, since he had plunged into the deep of the beech-wood. Hetook the path as one who needs must, and went his ways as it led. Insooth it was well-nigh blind, but he was a deft woodsman, and by means ofit skirted many a close thicket that had otherwise stayed him. So on hewent, and though the boughs were close enough overhead, and the sun camethrough but in flecks, he judged that it was growing towards noon, and hewotted well that he was growing aweary. For he had been long afoot, andthe more part of the time on a rough way, or breasting a slope which wasat whiles steep enough.
At last the track led him skirting about an exceeding close thicket intoa small clearing, through which ran a little woodland rill amidst rushesand dead leaves: there was a low mound near the eastern side of thiswood-lawn, as though there had been once a dwelling of man there, but noother sign or slot of man was there.
So Face-of-god made stay in that place, casting himself down beside therill to rest him and eat and drink somewhat. Whatever thoughts had beenwith him through the wood (and they been many) concerning his House andhis name, and his father, and the journey he might make to the cities ofthe Westland, and what was to befall him when he was wedded, and what waror trouble should be on his hands—all this was now mingled together andconfused by this rest amidst his weariness. He laid down his scrip, anddrew his meat from it and ate what he would, and dipping his gildedbeaker into the brook, drank water smacking of the damp musty savour ofthe woodland; and then his head sank back on a little mound in the shortturf, and he fell asleep at once. A long dream he had in short space;and therein were blent his thoughts of the morning with the deeds ofyesterday; and other matters long forgotten in his waking hours came backto his slumber in unordered confusion: all which made up for him picturesclear, but of little meaning, save that, as oft befalls in dreams,whatever he was a-doing he felt himself belated.
When he awoke, smiling at something strange in his gone-by dream, helooked up to the heavens, thinking to see signs of the even at hand, forhe seemed to have been dreaming so long. The sky was thinly overcast bynow, but by his wonted woodcraft he knew the whereabouts of the sun, andthat it was scant an hour after noon. He sat there till he was whollyawake, and then drank once more of the woodland water; and he said tohimself, but out loud, for he was fain of the sound of a man’s voice,though it were but his own:
‘What is mine errand hither? Whither wend I? What shall I have doneto-morrow that I have hitherto left undone? Or what manner of man shallI be then other than I am now?’
Yet though he said the words he failed to think the thought, or it lefthim in a moment of time, and he thought but of the Bride and herkindness. Yet that abode with him but a moment, and again he saw himselfand those two women on the highway edge, and Long-coat lingering on theslope below, kissing his kisses on her hands; and he was sorry that shedesired him over-much, for she was a fair woman and a friendly. But allthat also flowed from him at once, and he had no thought in him but thathe also desired something that he lacked: and this was a burden to him,and he rose up frowning, and said to himself, ‘Am I become a mere sportof dreams, whether I sleep or wake? I will go backward—or forward, butwill think no more.’
Then he ordered his gear again, and took the path onward and upwardtoward the Great Mountains; and the track was even fainter than beforefor a while, so that he had to seek his way diligently.