,
while Becfola sat staring at him until the unavoidable peace pressed
down her eyelids and she too slumbered.

She was awakened in the morning by a great shout.

"Come out, Flann, come out, my heart!"

The young man leaped from his couch, girded on his harness, and strode
out. Three young men met him, each in battle harness, and these four
advanced to meet four other men who awaited them at a little distance on
the lawn. Then these two sets of four fought togethor with every warlike
courtesy but with every warlike severity, and at the end of that combat
there was but one man standing, and the other seven lay tossed in death.

Becfola spoke to the youth.

"Your combat has indeed been gallant," she said.

"Alas," he replied, "if it has been a gallant deed it has not been a
good one, for my three brothers are dead and my four nephews are dead."

"Ah me!" cried Becfola, "why did you fight that fight?"

"For the lordship of this island, the Isle of Fedach, son of Dali."

But, although Becfola was moved and horrified by this battle, it was in
another direction that her interest lay; therefore she soon asked the
question which lay next her heart:

"Why would you not speak to me or look at me?"

"Until I have won the kingship of this land from all claimants, I am no
match for the mate of the High King of Ireland," he replied.

And that reply was llke balm to the heart of Becfola.

"What shall I do?" she inquired radiantly. "Return to your home," he
counselled. "I will escort you there with your maid, for she is not
really dead, and when I have won my lordship I will go seek you in
Tara."

"You will surely come," she insisted.

"By my hand," quoth he, "I will come."

These three returned then, and at the end of a day and night they saw
far off the mighty roofs of Tara massed in the morning haze. The
young man left them, and with many a backward look and with dragging,
reluctant feet, Becfola crossed the threshold of the palace, wondering
what she should say to Dermod and how she could account for an absence
of three days' duration.

CHAPTER IV

IT was so early that not even a bird was yet awake, and the dull grey
light that came from the atmosphere enlarged and made indistinct all
that one looked at, and swathed all things in a cold and livid gloom.

As she trod cautiously through dim corridors Becfola was glad that,
saving the guards, no creature was astir, and that for some time yet
she need accoun