with me, friend or foe, let him come hither to me."

So he fell to walking up and down the hall from buttery to dais, and
his war-gear rattled upon him. At last as he walked he thought he
heard a small thin peevish voice, which yet was too husky for the
squeak of a rat. So he stayed his walk and stood still, and said:
"Will any man speak to Hallblithe, a newcomer, and a stranger in this
Stead?"

Then that small voice made a word and said: "Why paceth the fool up
and down our hall, doing nothing, even as the Ravens flap croaking
about the crags, abiding the war-mote and the clash of the fallow
blades?"

Said Hallblithe, and his voice sounded big in the hall: "Who calleth
Hallblithe a fool and mocketh at the sons of the Raven?"

Spake the voice: "Why cometh not the fool to the man that may not go
to him?"

Then Hallblithe bent forward to hearken, and he deemed that the voice
came from one of the shut-beds, so he leaned his spear against a
pillar, and went into the shut-bed he had noted, and saw where there
lay along in it a man exceeding old by seeming, sore wasted, with
long hair as white as snow lying over the bed-clothes.

When the elder saw Hallblithe, he laughed a thin cracked laugh as if
in mockery and said: "Hail newcomer! wilt thou eat?"

"Yea," said Hallblithe.