So he said to her: 'Kinswoman, is it well with thee?'
'Yea,' she said, 'I am now nigh whole of my hurts.'
He was silent a while; then he said:
'And otherwise art thou merry at heart?'
'Yea, indeed,' said she; 'yet thou wilt not find it hard to deem that
I am sorry of the sundering betwixt me and Burgdale.'
Again was he silent, and said in a while: 'Dost thou deem that I
wrought that sundering?'
She smiled kindly on him and said: 'Gold-mane, my playmate, thou art
become a mighty warrior and a great chief; but thou art not so mighty
as that. Many things lay behind the sundering which were neither
thou nor I.'
'Yet,' said he, 'it was but such a little time agone that all things
seemed so sure; and we--to both of us was the outlook happy.'
'Let it be happy still,' she said, 'now begrudging is gone. Belike
the sundering came because we were so sure, and had no defence
against the wearing of the days; even as it fareth with a folk that
hath no foes.'
He smiled and said: 'Even as it hath befallen THY folk, O Bride, a
while ago.'
She reddened, and reached her hand to him, and he took it and held
it, and said: 'Shall I see thee again as the days wear?'
Said she: 'O chieftain of the Folk, thou shalt have much to do in
Burgdale, and the way is long.
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