ed to Ursula and found her with
the meat ready dight; so they ate and were glad.

When they had broken their fast Ralph went to saddle the horses, and
coming back found Ursula binding up her long hair, and she smiled on
him and said: "Now we are for the road I must be an armed knight again:
forsooth I unbound my hair e'en now and let my surcoat hang loose about
me in token that thou wottest my secret. Soothly, my friend, it irks
me that now we have met after a long while, I must needs be clad thus
graceless. But need drave me to it, and withal the occasion that was
given to me to steal this gay armour from a lad at Utterbol, the nephew
of the lord; who like his eme was half my lover, half my tyrant. Of
all which I will tell thee hereafter, and what wise I must needs steer
betwixt stripes and kisses these last days. But now let us arm and to
horse. Yet first lo you, here are some tools that in thine hands shall
keep us from sheer famine: as for me I am no archer; and forsooth no
man-at-arms save in seeming."

Therewith she showed him a short Turk bow and a quiver of arrows, which
he took well pleased. So then they armed each the other, and as she
handled Ralph's wargear she said: "How well-wrought and trusty is this
hauberk of thine, my friend; my coat is but a toy to it, with its gold
and silver rings and its gemmed collar: and thy plates be thick and
wide and well-wrought, whereas mine are little more than adornments to
my arms and legs."

He looked on her lovingly and loved her shapely hands amidst the dark
grey mail, and said: "That is well, dear friend, for since my breast
is a shield for thee it behoves it to be well covered." She looked at
him, and her lips trembled, and she put out her hand as if to touch his
cheek, but drew it back again and said: "Come now, let us to horse,
dear fellow in arms."

So they mounted and went their ways through a close pine-wood, where
the ground was covered with the pine-tree needles, and all was still
and windless. So as they rode said Ursula: "I seek tokens of the way
to the Sage of Swevenham. Hast thou seen a water yesterday?" "Yea,"
said Ralph, "I rode far along it, but left it because I deemed that it
turned north overmuch." "Thou wert right," she said, "besides that thy
turning from it hath brought us together; for it would have brought
thee to Utterbol at last. But now have we to hit upon another that
runneth straight down from the hills: not the Great Mount