He said: ‘This shalt thou have, and would that I might give thee much more. Would that we were little children together other again, as when we played here in other days.’ She said: ‘I would have a token of thee that thou shalt show to the God, and swear on it to give me the gift. For the times change.’ ‘What token wilt thou have?’ said he. She said: ‘When next thou farest to the Wood, thou shalt bring me back, it maybe a flower from the bank ye sit upon, or a splinter from the daïs of the hall wherein ye feast, or maybe a ring or some matter that the strangers are wont to wear. That shall be the token.’ She spoke slowly, hanging her head adown, but she lifted it presently and looked into his face and said: ‘Woe’s me, woe’s me, Gold-mane! How evil is this day, when bewailing me I may not bewail thee also! For I know that thine heart is glad. All through the winter have I kept this hidden in my heart, and durst not speak to thee. But now the spring-tide hath driven me to it. Let summer come, and who shall say?’ Great was his grief, and his shame kept him silent, and he had no word to say; and again she said: ‘Tell me, Gold-mane, when goest thou thither?’ He said: ‘I know not surely, may happen in two days, may happen in ten. Why askest thou?’ ‘O friend!’ she said, ‘is it a new thing that I should ask thee whither thou goest and whence thou comest, and the times of thy coming and going. Farewell to-day! Forget not the token. Woe’s me, that I may not kiss thy fair face!’ She spread her arms abroad and lifted up her face as one who waileth, but no sound came from her lips; then she turned about and went away as she had come. But as for him he stood there after she was gone in all confusion, as if he were undone: for he felt his manhood lessened that he should thus and so sorely have hurt a friend, and in a manner against his will. And yet he was somewhat wroth with her, that she had come upon him so suddenly, and spoken to him with such mastery, and in so few words, and he with none to make answer to her, and that she had so marred his pleasure and his hope of that fair day. Then he sat him down again on the flowery bank, and little by little his heart softened, and he once more called to mind many a time when they had been there before, and the plays and the games they had had together there when they were little. And he bethought him of the days that were long to him then, and now seemed short to him, and as if they were all grown together into one story, and that a sweet one. Then his breast heaved with a sob, and the tears rose to his eyes and burned and stung him, and he fell a-weeping for that sweet tale, and wept as he had wept once before on that old dyke when there had been some child’s quarrel between them, and she had gone away and left him.