She came no more. Night after night of dark,—only the star Memory and the sapphire star of passionate hope that once again, once again he would wake, clear, still, and know her there. “Even after years, oh, heaven that holds her, oh, God that sustains her! Even after years beyond counting.”

She came no more. The nights were slow dark raindrops, heavy, full, one after the other falling, slow falling, not to be counted. They made rosaries, they would make rosaries for aye. “Then I must go to her. Where is the eagle will show me the path?”

March—April. The rose in reliquary, the cave stone lined, the well widened into a fair pool with steps for going down, for coming up, one in so many healed! April—May. Noise of Silver Cross like a waving of forest trees, like a humming of all the bees in the meadows. Folk coming, going; more folk and more folk coming! At the Abbey a greater guest house in planning; in shambling village taverns, booths, houses rising. Pilgrims on foot and pilgrims on horseback and in litter. A bishop stayed three days in the Abbot’s house, there was rumour that the cardinal might come. The bells of Silver Cross rang jubilee.

Middle Forest relied now upon its own side of the river. Montjoy in his castle looked younger by ten years. He looked like some crusading Montjoy of long ago, long ago. The river murmured of both banks; the bridge seemed to have two loves. But the mount of Saint Leofric, though it said, “Praise for doubling!” seemed rather to wish to say, “Out upon division!” Prior Hugh, though he spoke gracious words, looked warped and wan and cogitative.

Early May at the ruined farm and Somerville and the helping-woman Joan in the forest, under a beech tree pale green and silver grey, springing tall and stretching wide. “I will to go back to my house by the river! All the world is joyous and grown softened—Oh, I hear it with the ear inside of ear and I touch it with the touch inside of touch! Good was done for all of the evil, was it not, Rob?”

He laughed. “Oh, woman—! You can’t go back. Father Edmund has three voices where he had one! Moreover—”

“Moreover—?”

“See you, Morgen, go up to London town.”

“And why should I go to London town?”

“Ask for that Westforest and Silver Cross.”

Under the beech tree was carpet of last year’s leaves. She lifted and crumbled them in her hands. “When I said that I would be secret, I meant not telling! They have no call to fear me.”

“Perhaps they tell themselves that. Or perhaps they see faint menace every time they look this way!”

“They promised that trouble should cease. I was going back to my own house over my own garden, by the river that I like to hear by day, by night. They said that Father Edmund should be checked. Presently I was to find that I might slip back—”

“What is promised is not easy sometimes to perform. They will give you gold in London. London is rich, and you are Morgen Fay. Go, and be powerful there!”

“And you—and you? Oh, I remember that you go once in five years to London!”

“If you cried out in Middle Forest market place what was done not a soul would believe you!”

“No. It is too monstrous!”

“Then and there the folk might tear you limb from limb for wild blaspheming. They are truly quite safe.”

She broke into high laughter. “Then let them leave me alone, and let them keep promise! It irks me that they are so false! Here are two months, and not yet may I go back! And Ailsa and Tony, where are they? I see them begging or in gaol!”

“You should be happy,” he said, “that you are not beggar nor in gaol.”

There fell silence. The beech tree sprang light green and silver, the sky was blue, the blackbirds talked, a thrush sang, wandering airs went by. The world was sweet. But she crushed the dead leaves and sat still.

“You must go. Need or no need, they will have it so! Nor can you stay at the ruined farm forever. Something will happen endangering you—endangering me.”

She said. “Is life wicked—or are we wicked—or are we dull and lifeless—stones, broken twigs, dead leaves? Many an one says that I am wicked, and doubtless I am at times. I know it—I know it! And then again I am not wicked. So if I say that you are so, poor Sir Robert Somerville? Perhaps I am mistaken—perhaps I am right. It’s a weary way to knowledge!”

“Were you gentler,” he said, “had you not such a tongue, you would find that the winds did not rock your nest so roughly!”

He stood up. “Ah, go!” she said. “Go! I have seen it coming—now it comes! Your road’s to John o’ Groat’s house and mine’s to Land’s End!”

“You mock the wind,” he answered, “with your nest fixed so firm upon the bough!”

He went away by woodman’s path, and she to the ruined farm. “Eh, lass!” said Margery at dusk. “You can work when your mind’s to it!”

The third day from this Somerville and she were again in the wood. “I am going. It is trudge! All of you make a north wind that I set my back against and go! Nor will I cry for it, Somerville!”

“You have no need to. They shall give you money. Walk or ride in a cart from here through the later half of night, keeping disguise. Come to the port in a day or so and find there the King Arthur bound for London. Find, too, upon the ship Ailsa—”

Red flowed over her face. “Oh, the power that men, and honest men, own! It is enough to make one willing to sell soul to devil!”

He waved that aside. “It is for your own safety that you are going. And were I wholly wicked I should not be here, nor Ailsa at the port awaiting you—”

She said. “That is true. I thank you there, Rob!”

She broke a spray of hazel, set her teeth in the green wood, then threw it away. “Shall we say good-by now, you and I?”

“Not just yet. Something has arisen since we sat here the other day. I have seen Prior Matthew.”

“Aye?”

“There is needed one more appearance. Question has arisen as to Saint Willebrod—if he rests still or if actively he aids! There are some who are devoted to him. Once more then!”

“Oh, I will not!”

His bright eyes dwelt upon her, all the lights played in his odd face. “Why not, Morgen? Be good-natured! I nor none am doing badly by you.”

“What do you get from this?”

“The old debatable land—and a piece that was not debatable. I love land! And I get playgoer’s enjoyment, watching from a good, quiet seat—and comfort that we’re all fruit just pleasantly specked and wasp-eaten—and some mirth from Montjoy’s ecstacy. So be good! What! There are houses by Thames in London. You may have a garden still—plant your rose tree there.”

It was high May weather. As once before Thomas Bettany had errand up the Wander,—merchant errand of account-to-be-paid. This time it was with Oak Tree Grange beyond Silver Cross. He rode in the May tide and with him rode John Cobb, and they had done the errand. Oak Tree Grange lay out of the world, and now they were on a cart track, nothing more.

Young Bettany rode light and happy on his big grey horse. May world was a fair world, fair, sweet, gay, kind! He whistled clear and strong. “I swear I saw God sitting on yon cloud!”

Said John Cobb, “I’m going to Silver Cross to get this old scar taken off my face.”

“Silver Cross. I don’t know.”

They were riding by a wood, old, uncut, dim. “This is Somerville’s land now! He always claimed it, and now the Abbey allows it.”

John Cobb looked about him. “I know now where we are. Over there, a mile through, is a ruined farm. Lonely! It’s so lonely you lose yourself—and there’s a ghost walks in the wood.”

“Let’s go look.”

John was not averse, being in the other’s company. They left cart track and rode over yielding earth under old trees. There was no path and the trees must be rounded. The way they had come sank from sight, almost it might seem from mind, so quick the place took them. Bettany’s blue eyes sparkled. He loved all this; he might come at any moment upon wizard’s tower. What indeed they came upon was another faint track, leading north and south. “Abbey is that way and Somerville Hall that way, and over there is the turn to the road we left. They come in and go out that way—but, Lord, there’s mortal little travel! You might say it’s a witched place.”

“That is what I like!” said the other. “Oh, if I might I would travel far!”

They rode as though it were bottom of the sea, it was so green and silent. Bettany turned in his saddle and studied the lay of the place. “When Somerville goes to Silver Cross I think he takes this way. It’s not so far.”

“Turn here to the ruined farm. David that lives here, I’ve heard my mother say, was foster brother to Sir Robert’s father.”

They rode on and now they saw the ruined farm between the trees. A wreck it seemed, like a broken ship slipped down to sea floor. Then by a thorn in bloom stood up Morgen Fay.

“Who are you?”

“Who are you?”

In a moment she knew him and Bettany knew her for all her servant dress and stained face. “How do you come here—how do you come here? You are in London—”

John Cobb crossed himself. “Like she be a sorceress, too—”

Morgen stepped from the thorn to the side of the big grey horse. She met blue eyes with dark eyes. Her lips smiled, her eyes and under her eyes. “Oh, the saints!” she said. “I can but be glad to see you, lad! You are no telltale! Can you teach your man to be none either?”

“I can that. But Morgen Fay, how did you grow here?”

He swung himself down from his horse and stood beside her. John Cobb gaped. “Send him a little away,” she said, “but do not let him out of sight. This world’s a danger-bush where the thorn is always near the may!”

They talked. “Do you remember that foggy day when you climbed through window? I have not seen you since! I like you, though not the way that all expect. I wish I might have had you for brother. Well, they would stone me—burn me, maybe—in the market place, Father Edmund preaching over me! I dwell at the ruined farm.”

Intelligence flashed between them. “Somerville saved you—put you here. I think the better of him!” He spoke sturdily, a young spiritual adventurer.

She looked at him with eyes that seemed to have considered a myriad matters. She sighed—she stretched her arms in a yearning gesture in the dim gulf of the world into which the wood seemed to have turned. “It is away to London! Maybe I shall never again see you nor Somerville nor Montjoy, who is too good now to be seen close, nor Middle Forest High Street that I danced in when I was a little girl, nor my house that I liked, though often was I wretched in it! Nor my garden that the old wall mothered, nor river that I listened to and listened to. Well, tide and time we run away! But where we run to, that is a question for a wise man! They say that we run to heaven or to hell—and I shouldn’t dare say my road was the first!”

Without warning Thomas Bettany found himself priest. “If you’ve strayed into wrong road, turn and take the other! You’ve got more than you think of the other in you now. Turn, Morgen!” He regarded her with a sudden startled face. “By the rood! It’s the Great Adventure.”

She looked at him with more of the thorn in her face than the bloom. From beyond an oak came John Cobb’s warning voice. “Some one’s coming! Two or three!”

“Go at once!” said Morgen Fay, and so meant it that she wrought their going. Bettany, obeying her, rode without turning his head, straight through the wood. The trees fell like fountains between the two and the thorn bush. To the right lay the ruined farm, but they pushed on and came after a mile to the narrow, little travelled road that led at last to the highway that, passing Silver Cross, ran on to Middle Forest.