ence
in your friends? It is for your own good that I must have the token.
Give it me at once.'

The place in which this discussion was carried on was so inconvenient
to Raymond, he was getting so exhausted, both in body and mind, and
the dwarf had spoken the last sentence so imperiously, that Raymond
thought he had better yield. Moreover, the yellow cap squeezed his
brain just in those places where the proper arguments lay, and thus
prevented his using them. The end of it was that he said--

'I suppose you'd better take it, but----'

He never finished his sentence. The dwarf whipped the silken string
over his head, and the golden pledge was gone. The next moment Raymond
was floundering headlong in the stream. How he reached the opposite
bank he never knew--he seemed to be under the water half the time. At
last he got his hands on a bush growing beside the margin and pulled
himself out.

Where was the dwarf? He had vanished. Had he fallen off and been
drowned? What was that echo of a metallic chuckle in the air? Raymond
groaned and pressed his hands to his aching head, on which the yellow
cap stuck fast.

CHAPTER IV.

THE TALISMAN.

After a while he got up and looked about him. The river was much
swollen, and was hurrying past its banks with such fury that it was
useless to think of returning as he had come. No, he must go on. His
head was confused, so that he could not think clearly about Honeymead,
and still less about Rosamund. She seemed far away and indistinct. Did
she love him? Did he love her? At all events, it was better to fix his
mind on London now. He looked thither, but the clouds had gathered
over the sky, and the sunlight no longer gleamed upon the golden
pinnacles. The city did not seem so alluring as from the other side of
the river. However, time was flying, and London was seven miles away.
Raymond set forth.

By and by he came to a milestone, on which he sat down to rest, and to
wonder how he was to make his fortune in London when he got there. It
was true that he had a talisman, but how was that to help him? A
yellow cap! It was, indeed, woven of golden thread, and might be sold
for a guinea; but a guinea was not a kingdom. Meanwhile the cap made
his head ache so that he pulled it off. It was certainly a fine cap.
It was lined with the best yellow satin, and a peacock's feather was
stuck in the band. On the band some letters were embroidered. Raymond
spelt them out, and found that t