nd still went on, till the
fashion of the thickets and the woods changed about him; and at last
when the sun was getting low, he saw light gleaming through a great
wood of pines, which had long been dark before him against the tall
boles, and soon he came to the very edge of the wood, and going
heedfully, saw between the great stems of the outermost trees, a green
strand, and beyond it a long smooth water, a little lake between green
banks on either side. He came out of the pinewood on to the grass; but
there were thornbushes a few about, so that moving warily from one to
the other, he might perchance see without being seen. Warily he went
forsooth, going along the green strand to the east and the head of that
water, and saw how the bank sloped up gently from its ending toward the
pine-wood, in front of whose close-set trees stood three great-boled
tall oak-trees on a smooth piece of green sward. And now he saw that
there were folk come before him on this green place, and keen-sighted
as he was, could make out that three men were on the hither side of the
oak-trees, and on the further side of them was a white horse.
Thitherward then he made, stealing from bush to bush, since he deemed
that he needed not be seen of men who might be foes, for at the first
sight he had noted the gleam of weapons there. And now he had gone no
long way before he saw the westering sun shine brightly from a naked
sword, and then another sprang up to meet it, and he heard faintly the
clash of steel, and saw withal that the third of the folk had long and
light raiment and was a woman belike. Then he bettered his pace, and
in a minute or two came so near that he could see the men clearly, that
they were clad in knightly war-gear, and were laying on great strokes
so that the still place rang with the clatter. As for the woman, he
could see but little of her, because of the fighting men before her;
and the shadow of the oak boughs fell on her withal.
Now as he went, hidden by the bushes, they hid the men also from him,
and when he was come to the last bush, some fifty paces from them, and
peered out from it, in that very nick of time the two knights were
breathing them somewhat, and Ralph saw that one of them, the furthest
from him, was a very big man with a blue surcoat whereon was beaten a
great golden sun, and the other, whose back was towards Ralph, was clad
in black over his armour. Even as he looked and doubted whether to
show himself
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