rain. And Walter noted that those two, the
elder and the Maid, eyed each other curiously amidst of this talk; the
elder intent on what she might say, and if she gave heed to his words;
while on her side the Maid answered his speech graciously and pleasantly,
but said little that was of any import: nor would she have him fix her
eyes, which wandered lightly from this thing to that; nor would her lips
grow stern and stable, but ever smiled in answer to the light of her
eyes, as she sat there with her face as the very face of the gladness of
the summer day.

CHAPTER XXVIII: OF THE NEW GOD OF THE BEARS

At last the old man said: "My children, ye shall now come with me unto
the Doom-ring of our folk, the Bears of the Southern Dales, and deliver
to them your errand; and I beseech you to have pity upon your own bodies,
as I have pity on them; on thine especially, Maiden, so fair and bright a
creature as thou art; for so it is, that if ye deal us out light and
lying words after the manner of dastards, ye shall miss the worship and
glory of wending away amidst of the flames, a gift to the God and a hope
to the people, and shall be passed by the rods of the folk, until ye
faint and fail amongst them, and then shall ye be thrust down into the
flow at the Dale's End, and a stone-laden hurdle cast upon you, that we
may thenceforth forget your folly."

The Maid now looked full into his eyes, and Walter deemed that the old
man shrank before her; but she said: "Thou art old and wise, O great man
of the Bears, yet nought I need to learn of thee. Now lead us on our way
to the Stead of the Errands."

So the elder brought them along to the Doom-ring at the eastern end of
the Dale; and it was now all peopled with those huge men, weaponed after
their fashion, and standing up, so that the grey stones thereof but
showed a little over their heads. But amidmost of the said Ring was a
big stone, fashioned as a chair, whereon sat a very old man, long-hoary
and white-bearded, and on either side of him stood a great-limbed woman
clad in war-gear, holding, each of them, a long spear, and with a flint-
bladed knife in the girdle; and there were no other women in all the
Mote.

Then the elder led those twain into the midst of the Mote, and there bade
them go up on to a wide, flat-topped stone, six feet above the ground,
just over against the ancient chieftain; and they mounted it by a rough
stair, and stood there before that folk; Walte