all this for thee?"

Said the carle: "I did none of all this; there was one here before me,
and I entered into his inheritance, as though this were a lordly manor,
with a fair castle thereon, and all well stocked and plenished."

Said Walter: "Didst thou find thy foregoer alive here?"

"Yea," said the elder, "yet he lived but for a little while after I came
to him."

He was silent a while, and then he said: "I slew him: even so would he
have it, though I bade him a better lot."

Said Walter: "Didst thou come hither of thine own will?"

"Mayhappen," said the carle; "who knoweth? Now have I no will to do
either this or that. It is wont that maketh me do, or refrain."

Said Walter: "Tell me this; why didst thou slay the man? did he any
scathe to thee?"

Said the elder: "When I slew him, I deemed that he was doing me all
scathe: but now I know that it was not so. Thus it was: I would needs go
where he had been before, and he stood in the path against me; and I
overthrew him, and went on the way I would."

"What came thereof?" said Walter.

"Evil came of it," said the carle.

Then was Walter silent a while, and the old man spake nothing; but there
came a smile in his face that was both sly and somewhat sad. Walter
looked on him and said: "Was it from hence that thou wouldst go that
road?"

"Yea," said the carle.

Said Walter: "And now wilt thou tell me what that road was; whither it
went and whereto it led, that thou must needs wend it, though thy first
stride were over a dead man?"

"I will not tell thee," said the carle.

Then they held their peace, both of them, and thereafter got on to other
talk of no import.

So wore the day till night came; and they slept safely, and on the morrow
after they had broken their fast, the more part of them set off with the
carle to the hunting, and they went, all of them, a three hours' faring
towards the foot of the cliffs, which was all grown over with coppice,
hazel and thorn, with here and there a big oak or ash-tree; there it was,
said the old man, where the venison was most and best.

Of their hunting need nought be said, saving that when the carle had put
them on the track of the deer and shown them what to do, he came back
again with Walter, who had no great lust for the hunting, and sorely
longed to have some more talk with the said carle. He for his part
seemed nought loth thereto, and so led Walter to a mound or hillock
amidst the clear of the plain,