Chapter Chapter 2 · GOLDEN WALTER TAKES SHIP TO SAIL THE SEAS

. GOLDEN WALTER TAKES SHIP TO SAIL THE SEAS

When Walter went down to the Katherine next morning, there was the

skipper Geoffrey, who did him reverence, and made him all cheer, and

showed him his room aboard ship, and the plenteous goods which his father

had sent down to the quays already, such haste as he had made. Walter

thanked his father's love in his heart, but otherwise took little heed to

his affairs, but wore away the time about the haven, gazing listlessly on

the ships that were making them ready outward, or unlading, and the

mariners and aliens coming and going: and all these were to him as the

curious images woven on a tapestry.

At last when he had wellnigh come back again to the Katherine, he saw

there a tall ship, which he had scarce noted before, a ship all-boun,

which had her boats out, and men sitting to the oars thereof ready to tow

her outwards when the hawser should be cast off, and by seeming her

mariners were but abiding for some one or other to come aboard.

So Walter stood idly watching the said ship, and as he looked, lo! folk

passing him toward the gangway. These were three; first came a dwarf,

dark-brown of hue and hideous, with long arms and ears exceeding great

and dog-teeth that stuck out like the fangs of a wild beast. He was clad

in a rich coat of yellow silk, and bare in his hand a crooked bow, and

was girt with a broad sax.

After him came a maiden, young by seeming, of scarce twenty summers; fair

of face as a flower; grey-eyed, brown-haired, with lips full and red,

slim and gentle of body. Simple was her array, of a short and strait

green gown, so that on her right ankle was clear to see an iron ring.

Last of the three was a lady, tall and stately, so radiant of visage and

glorious of raiment, that it were hard to say what like she was; for

scarce might the eye gaze steady upon her exceeding beauty; yet must

every son of Adam who found himself anigh her, lift up his eyes again

after he had dropped them, and look again on her, and yet again and yet

again. Even so did Walter, and as the three passed by him, it seemed to

him as if all the other folk there about had vanished and were nought;

nor had he any vision before his eyes of any looking on them, save

himself alone. They went over the gangway into the ship, and he saw them

go along the deck till they came to the house on the poop, and entered it

and were gone from his sight.

There he stood staring, till little by little the thronging people of the

quays came into his eye-shot again; then he saw how the hawser was cast

off and the boats fell to tugging the big ship toward the harbour-mouth

with hale and how of men. Then the sail fell down from the yard and was

sheeted home and filled with the fair wind as the ship's bows ran up on

the first green wave outside the haven. Even therewith the shipmen cast

abroad a banner, whereon was done in a green field a grim wolf ramping up

against a maiden, and so went the ship upon her way.

Walter stood awhile staring at her empty place where the waves ran into

the haven-mouth, and then turned aside and toward the Katherine; and at

first he was minded to go ask shipmaster Geoffrey of what he knew

concerning the said ship and her alien wayfarers; but then it came into

his mind, that all this was but an imagination or dream of the day, and

that he were best to leave it untold to any. So therewith he went his

way from the water-side, and through the streets unto his father's house;

but when he was but a little way thence, and the door was before him, him-

seemed for a moment of time that he beheld those three coming out down

the steps of stone and into the street; to wit the dwarf, the maiden, and

the stately lady: but when he stood still to abide their coming, and

looked toward them, lo! there was nothing before him save the goodly

house of Bartholomew Golden, and three children and a cur dog playing

about the steps thereof, and about him were four or five passers-by going

about their business. Then was he all confused in his mind, and knew not

what to make of it, whether those whom he had seemed to see pass aboard

ship were but images of a dream, or children of Adam in very flesh.

Howsoever, he entered the house, and found his father in the chamber, and

fell to speech with him about their matters; but for all that he loved

his father, and worshipped him as a wise and valiant man, yet at that

hour he might not hearken the words of his mouth, so much was his mind

entangled in the thought of those three, and they were ever before his

eyes, as if they had been painted on a table by the best of limners. And

of the two women he thought exceeding much, and cast no wyte upon himself

for running after the desire of strange women. For he said to himself

that he desired not either of the twain; nay, he might not tell which of

the twain, the maiden or the stately queen, were clearest to his eyes;

but sore he desired to see both of them again, and to know what they

were.

So wore the hours till the Wednesday morning, and it was time that he

should bid farewell to his father and get aboard ship; but his father led

him down to the quays and on to the Katherine, and there Walter embraced

him, not without tears and forebodings; for his heart was full. Then

presently the old man went aland; the gangway was unshipped, the hawsers

cast off; the oars of the towing-boats splashed in the dark water, the

sail fell down from the yard, and was sheeted home, and out plunged the

Katherine into the misty sea and rolled up the grey slopes, casting

abroad her ancient withal, whereon was beaten the token of Bartholomew

Golden, to wit a B and a G to the right and the left, and thereabove a

cross and a triangle rising from the midst.

Walter stood on the stern and beheld, yet more with the mind of him than

with his eyes; for it all seemed but the double of what the other ship

had done; and the thought of it as if the twain were as beads strung on

one string and led away by it into the same place, and thence to go in

the like order, and so on again and again, and never to draw nigher to

each other.