"
"Nay nay," quoth Roger, "thou art angry, and I marvel not thereat;
but let thy wrath run off thee if thou mayest; for indeed what I
have told thee of myself and my griefs is not all mere lying.
Neither was it any lie that thou wert in peril of thy life amongst
those tyrants of the Burg; thou with thy manly bearing, and free
tongue, and bred, as I judge, to hate cruel deeds and injustice.
Such freedom they cannot away with in that fellowship of
hard men-at-arms; and soon hadst thou come to harm amongst them.
And further, let alone that it is not ill to be sundered
from yonder company, who mayhap will have rough work to do
or ever they win home, I have nought to do to bring thee
to Hampton under Scaur if thou hast no will to go thither:
though certes I would lead thee some whither, whereof thou
shalt ask me nought as now; yet will I say thereof this much,
that there thou shalt be both safe and well at ease.
Now lastly know this, that whatever I have done, I have done
it to do thee good and not ill; and there is also another one,
whom I will not name to thee, who wisheth thee better yet,
by the token of those two strokes stricken by thee in the Wood
Perilous before yesterday was a day."
Now when Ralph heard those last words, such strong and sweet hope
and desire stirred in him to see that woman of the Want-ways
of the Wood Perilous that he forgat all else, except that he must
nowise fall to strife with Roger, lest they should sunder,
and he should lose the help of him, which he now deemed would
bring him to sight of her whom he had unwittingly come to long
for more than aught else; so he spake to Roger quietly and humbly:
"Well, faring-fellow, thou seest how I am little more than
a lad, and have fallen into matters mighty and perilous,
which I may not deal with of my own strength, at least until
I get nigher to them so that I may look them in the eyes,
and strike a stroke or two on them if they be at enmity with me.
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