dening, "and is there any hope for her getting
clear off?" "So I deem," said Agatha. She was silent awhile and then
spake in a low voice: "It is said that each man that seeth her loveth
her; yea, and will befriend her, even though she consent not to his
desire. Maybe she hath fled from Utterbol."

Ralph stood silent awhile with a troubled face; and then he said: "Yet
thou hast not told me the why and wherefore of this play of thine, and
the beguiling me into fleeing from the camp. Tell it me that I may
pardon thee and pass on."

She said: "By thine eyes I swear that this is sooth, and that there is
naught else in it than this: My lady set her love, when first she set
her eyes upon thee--as forsooth all women must: as for me, I had not
seen thee (though I told my lady that I had) till within this hour that
we met in the wood."

She sighed therewith, and with her right hand played with the rent
raiment about her bosom. Then she said: "She deemed that if thou
camest a mere thrall to Utterbol, though she might command thy body,
yet she would not gain thy love; but that if perchance thou mightest
see her in hard need, and evilly mishandled, and mightest deliver her,
there might at least grow up pity in thee for her, and that love might
come thereof, as oft hath happed aforetime; for my lady is a fair
woman. Therefore I, who am my lady's servant and thrall, and who, I
bid thee remember, had not seen thee, took upon me to make this
adventure, like to a minstrel's tale done in the flesh. Also I spake
to my lord and told him thereof; and though he jeered at my lady to me,
he was content, because he would have her set her heart on thee
utterly; since he feared her jealousy, and would fain be delivered of
it, lest she should play some turn to his newly beloved damsel and do
her a mischief. Therefore did he set thee free (in words) meaning,
when he had thee safe at Utterbol again (as he nowise doubted to have
thee) to do as he would with thee, according as occasion might serve.
For at heart he hateth thee, as I could see well. So a little before
thou didst leave the camp, we, the Queen and I, went privily into a
place of the woods but a little way hence. There I disarrayed both my
lady and myself so far as was needful for the playing out the play
which was to have seemed to thee a real adventure. Then came I to thee
as if by chance hap, that I might bring thee to her; and if thou hadst
come, we had a story for thee,