here ravished while the steward went to fetch the
Sub-prior, and brought him presently, a kind and holy man, and humble
of demeanour.

He spake to them and said: "My daughters, it is told me that ye need
somewhat of our house in all honesty and holiness; now when ye have
laid your gift on the altar, if ye will come with me and our steward
here to the parlour, I will hearken to all ye have to say, and if the
thing ye need of us can be done, done it shall be." They thanked him
humbly and went and made their oblation, and prayed, and the Sub-prior
blessed them, and brought them out of the church into the parlour, and
there they sat down together.

Then the Carline opened her budget, and told how they two had suffered
from war and rapine, and when they had been delivered from a foul
caitiff by a good Knight who had cherished them with all honours in
his house, and all went well a while, it endured not long, for needs
must he go to the wars, and there was he slain: how they, to escape
the malice of the mother of the said Knight, who was a proud and hard
woman, and now that her son was dead neither loved nor feared aught,
must needs flee away. "But withal," said the Carline, "even had that
good and kind Knight lived and come back to us, needs must we have
left his house, and his kindness ere long. For this I must do you to
wit," says she, "that we deem we have a weird and a fortune abiding
us, and that through all trouble we shall be brought thereto in the
end, and that the said Knight's house of Brookside was over-far from
it. This therefore we ask of you, since ye have shown such kindness
unto us as the man of Samaria to him who fell amongst thieves."

The Sub-prior smiled at her word and said: "Well, dame, neither the
priest nor the Levite pass by the poor souls."

"Father," she said, "thou and thy house, are ye foes or friends to the
Knight of Longshaw?"

The Sub-prior smiled: "Friends forsooth," said he, "so far as we may
do him any good; but ye wot that we give him no carnal help with sword
and spear, yea and little indeed might we give were we temporal lords,
so far off as we be from Longshaw, and the river and the Wood
Masterless lying all between us. And now indeed we begin to deem that
the good Knight may yet come to his above, though ere he had given the
Barons' League that great overthrow things seemed much going awry with
him. Moreover we have heard of a new champion whom he hath gotten, and
who counted for