come down, he found that it covered him from
men coming out of the wood, if he went straight thence to that shard of
the rock-wall where was the pass that led southward.

Now it is no nay that thitherward he turned, and went wisely, lest the
carle should make a backward cast, and see him, or lest any straggler of
his own folk might happen upon him.

For to say sooth, he deemed that did they wind him, they would be like to
let him of his journey. He had noted the bearings of the cliffs nigh the
shard, and whereas he could see their heads everywhere except from the
depths of the thicket, he was not like to go astray.

He had made no great way ere he heard the horns blowing all together
again in one place, and looking thitherward through the leafy boughs (for
he was now amidst of a thicket) he saw his men thronging the mound, and
had no doubt therefore that they were blowing on him; but being well
under cover he heeded it nought, and lying still a little, saw them go
down off the mound and go all of them toward the carle's house, still
blowing as they went, but not faring scatter-meal. Wherefore it was
clear that they were nought troubled about him.

So he went on his way to the shard; and there is nothing to say of his
journey till he got before it with the last of the clear day, and entered
it straightway. It was in sooth a downright breach or cleft in the rock-
wall, and there was no hill or bent leading up to it, nothing but a
tumble of stones before it, which was somewhat uneasy going, yet needed
nought but labour to overcome it, and when he had got over this, and was
in the very pass itself, he found it no ill going: forsooth at first it
was little worse than a rough road betwixt two great stony slopes, though
a little trickle of water ran down amidst of it. So, though it was so
nigh nightfall, yet Walter pressed on, yea, and long after the very night
was come. For the moon rose wide and bright a little after nightfall.
But at last he had gone so long, and was so wearied, that he deemed it
nought but wisdom to rest him, and so lay down on a piece of greensward
betwixt the stones, when he had eaten a morsel out of his satchel, and
drunk of the water out of the stream. There as he lay, if he had any
doubt of peril, his weariness soon made it all one to him, for presently
he was sleeping as soundly as any man in Langton on Holm.

CHAPTER VIII: WALTER WENDS THE WASTE

Day was yet young when he awoke: h