el, is it not? Only something happened to your arrow,
something that has never happened to any arrow of yours before. Oh, yes,
you have saved me from the Italian cut-throats, and being a gentleman I
thank you very much. Only why did the arrow burst in your bow?" and he
smiled with those dreadful eyes of his.

Now, feeling overwhelmed for the second time that night, Grey Dick sat
himself down upon a quay post. It was clear to him that to argue
with this person in a yellow cap who talked Suffolk so well was quite
useless. Why, then, waste breath which was probably his last?

Everybody seemed to be falling into meditation again, when the Man,
shifting his head slowly, began to consider Hugh.

"What is your name and which is your country, O my second saviour?"
he asked, still speaking in English. Only now the English was of a
different and more refined sort to that which he had used when he
addressed Dick; such English, for instance, as came from the lips of Sir
Geoffrey Carleon or from those of the lords of Edward's Court.

"I am Sir Hugh de Cressi of Dunwich, in the county of Suffolk, in
England," answered Hugh slowly.

"England. I have heard of England, and Dunwich; I have heard of Dunwich.
Indeed, I travel thither, having an appointment with an old friend in
that town."

Now a light came into Hugh's bewildered face, but he said nothing.

"I seem to have touched some chord of recollection in your mind, O my
saviour of Dunwich," said the Man. "Look at me and tell me, who am I?"

Hugh looked, and shook his head.

"I never saw you before, nor any one at all like you," he answered.

"No, no; you never saw me, though I have been very near to you once or
twice. Yet, your pardon, look again."

Hugh obeyed, and this time, for a second only, perceived that the Man's
head was surrounded by a multitude of doves. Two endless lines of
doves, one line black and the other line white, stretched from his right
shoulder and from his left shoulder, till miles away they melted into
the lofty gloom of the sky that was full of the soughing sound of their
wings.

Now he knew, and for the first time in his life fell upon his knees to a
man, or to what bore the semblance of man.

"You are named Murgh, Gate of the Gods," he said. "Murgh, whom old Sir
Andrew saw in that courtyard over which the iron dragons watch in the
country called Cathay, that courtyard with the pool of water and the
many doors."

"Ay," answered the Man in a n