she drew me hither: for what cause?'

Therewith he fell asleep again, and dreamed no more. But when he
awoke the sun was shining broad upon the hall-floor, and he sat up
and listened, but could hear no sound save the moaning of the wind in
the pine-boughs and the chatter of the starlings about the gables of
the house; and the place seemed so exceeding lonely to him that he
was in a manner feared by that loneliness.

Then he arose and clad himself, and went forth into the hall and
gazed about him, and at first he deemed indeed that there was no one
therein. But at last he looked and beheld the upper gable and there
underneath a most goodly hanging was the glorious shape of a woman
sitting on a bench covered over with a cloth of gold and silver; and
he looked and looked to see if the woman might stir, and if she were
alive, and she turned her head toward him, and lo it was the Friend;
and his heart rose to his mouth for wonder and fear and desire. For
now he doubted whether the other folk were aught save shows and
shadows, and she the Goddess who had fashioned them out of nothing
for his bewilderment, presently to return to nothing.

Yet whatever he might fear or doubt, he went up the hall towards her
till he was quite nigh to her, and there he stood silent, wondering
at her beauty and desiring her kindness.

Grey-eyed she was like her brother; but her hair the colour of red
wheat: her lips full and red, her chin round, her nose fine and
straight. Her hands and all her body fashioned exceeding sweetly and
delicately; yet not as if she were an image of which the like might
be found if the craftsman were but deft enough to make a perfect