"So. This is thou, Eadwulf? I thought as much. What brings thee hither?" "Almost as fair cause as I find fair welcome." "I looked for no other. Thou art a runaway, then, and pursued? Come, speak out, man, if thou wouldst have me aid thee." "Thou dost not seem overly glad to see me, brother." "How should I be glad? When did thy presence ever bring joy, or aught else than disaster and disgrace? But speak, what brings thee hither? How hast thou escaped? Art thou pursued? What dost thou require?" "Last asked, first answered. Rest, refuge, clothing, food, asylum. Last Monday is a week, I _was_ pursued; pursuit has ceased, but I misdoubt me I am tracked. By strong hand I escaped, and fleet foot----" "By red hand?" asked Kenric. "Ay! red, with the blood of deer!" "And of man, Eadwulf? Nay! man, lie not to me. Dark as it is, I read it in thy black brow and sullen eye." "Well, then, man's blood, if you will. And now, will you yield your own brother's life a forfeit to the man-hunter, or the hunter of blood?" "No," answered Kenric, sadly; "that must not be. For you _are_ my brother. But I must know _all_, or I will do nothing. You can tell me as we go; my home is in the valley yonder. There you can rest to-night; to-morrow you must away to the wilderness, there to be safe, if you may, without bringing ruin upon those who, doing all for you, look for nothing from you but wrong and ingratitude." "To-morrow! True brotherly affection! Right Saxon hospitality. Our fathers would have called this _nidering_!" "Never heed thou that. Tell me all that has passed, or thou goest not to my house, even for this night only. For myself, I care nothing, and fear nothing. My wife, and my mother--these, thy blind selfishness and brute instincts, at least, shall not ruin." And thereupon, finding farther evasion useless, as they went homeward by a circuitous path among the rocks and dingles, he revealed all that the reader knows already, and this farther, which it is probable he has suspected, that Eadwulf, lying concealed in the forest in pursuance of some petty depredation, had been a witness of the dastardly murder of Sir Philip de Morville by the hands of Sir Foulke d'Oilly and his train, among whom most active was the black seneschal, who had perished so fearfully in the quicksands.