"I come from the convent of St. Peter, at Gloucester," he said. "The abbot bids me give a message to your majesty."
"Abbot Serlon; a good Norman he," said the king. "What would he say?"
"Your majesty," said the monk, with great humility, "he bids me state that one of his monks has dreamed a dream of evil omen. He deems the king should know it."
"A dream!" declared the king. "Has he sent you hither to carry shadows? Well, tell me your dream. Time presses."
"The dream was this. The monk, in his sleep, saw Jesus Christ sitting on a throne, and at his feet kneeled a woman, who supplicated him in these words: 'Saviour of the human race, look down with pity on thy people groaning under the yoke of William.'"
The king greeted this message with a loud laugh.
"Do they take me for an Englishman, with their dreams?" he asked. "Do they fancy that I am fool enough to give up my plans because a monk dreams or an old woman sneezes? Go, tell your abbot I have heard his story. Come, Walter de Poix, to horse!"
The train swept away, leaving the monkish messenger alone, the king's disdainful laugh still in his ears. With William were his brother Henry, long at odds with him, now reconciled, William de Breteuil, and several other nobles. Quickly they vanished among the thickly clustering trees, and soon broke up into small groups, each of which took its own route through the forest. Walter Tyrrell alone remained with the king, their dogs hunting together.
That was the last that was seen of William, the Red King, alive. When the hunters returned he was not with them. Tyrrell, too, was missing. What had become of them? Search was made, but neither could be found, and doubt and trouble of soul pervaded Malwood-Keep.
The shades of night were fast gathering when a poor charcoal-burner, passing with his cart through the forest, came upon a dead body stretched bleeding upon the grass. An arrow had pierced its breast. Lifting it into his cart, wrapped in old linen, he jogged slowly onward, the blood still dripping and staining the ground as he passed. Not till he reached the hunting-lodge did he discover that it was the corpse of a king he had found in the forest depths. The dead body was that of William II. of England.