Bellarion thought the form of address an odd one. A minorite is brother, not father, to all humanity. But it was no suspicion based on this that brought him to his feet. He was a youth of cleanly habits, and if there was water at hand, he too would profit by it. So he rose, picked up his cloak, and went off in the wake of the swiftly moving friar. When, presently, he overtook him, Bellarion made him a present of a proverb. 'Who goes slowly, goes soundly.' 'But never gets there,' was the slightly breathless answer. 'And it's still some way to the water.' 'Some way? But you said ...' 'Aye, aye. I was mistaken. One place is like another in this labyrinth. I am none so sure that I am not as lost as you are.' It must have been so, for they trudged a full mile before they came to a brook that flowed westward towards the river. It lay in a dell amid mossy boulders and spreading fronds of ferns all dappled now with the golden light that came splashing through the trees. They found a pool of moderate dimensions in a bowl of grey stone fashioned by the ceaseless sculpture of the water. It was too shallow to afford a bath. But the friar's ablutionary dispositions scarce seemed to demand so much. He rinsed face and hands perfunctorily, whilst Bellarion stripped to the waist, and displaying a white torso of much beauty and more vigour, did what was possible in that cramped space. After that the friar produced from one of the sack-like pockets of his habit an enormous piece of sausage and a loaf of rye bread. To Bellarion who had gone supperless to bed this was as the sight of manna in the desert. 'Little brother!' he cooed in sheer delight. 'Little brother!' 'Aye, aye. We have our uses, we little brothers of Saint Francis.' The minorite sliced the sausage in two equal halves. 'We know how to provide ourselves upon a journey.' They fell to eating, and with the stilling of his hunger Bellarion experienced an increasing kindliness to this Good Samaritan. At the friar's suggestion that they should be moving so as to cover the greater part of the road to Casale before the noontide heat, Bellarion stood up, brushing the crumbs from his lap. In doing so his hand came in contact with the scrip that dangled from his girdle. 'Saints of God!' he ejaculated, as he tightened his clutch upon that bag of green cloth. The beady eyes of the minorite were upon him, and there was blank inquiry in that ashen, corrugated face. 'What is it, brother?' Bellarion's fingers groped within the bag a moment, then turned it inside out, to reveal its utter emptiness. He showed his companion a face which blended suspicion with dismay. 'I have been robbed!' he said.