“The dark tall man was a little behind and saw everything. He turned to escape; but I struck him with the rod, and made a sheep of the traitor, in hopes that the gray wolf might eat him. The hero saw all, saw the wolf that I was, turned into a man. I entered the castle; he followed me. I took you at once with me, showed you this hollow place near the chimney, and hid in it. The hero searched every foot of the castle, but found no trace of me. He had no knowledge of who I was; and when you denied that I was here, he waited one day, a second day, and then went away, taking your sister and the best hound at the castle.
“That hero of the island, whose mother I killed, is the Half Slim Champion. There is nothing he wishes so much as my death; and when he hears who it was that has never been born, and never will be, he will know that I am alive yet, and he’ll kill half the people in Lochlin, unless he kills me first of all, or this champion kills him.”
When Arthur heard this story, he went away quickly from the castle of the King of Lochlin, and never stopped till he came to the hill where he played cards the first time. The Half Slim Champion was before him there, standing.
“Have you found the answer, and can you tell who has never been born, and never will be?”
“Try behind your own ear, and you’ll find the mark on him.”
“That’s true,” said the champion, “and the man who killed my mother is alive yet; but if he is, he will not be so long, and you’ll not leave this till you and I have a trial.”
The two went at each other then; and it was early enough in the day when Arthur had the head off the champion. He put a gad through his ears, took the head on his shoulder, hurried back to the King of Lochlin, and threw it on the floor, saying, “Here is the head of the Half Slim Champion.”
When the old king heard these words in his place of concealment, he burst out the wall, and went through the end of the castle, so great was his joy. As soon as he was in the open air, free from confinement and dread, he became the best man in Lochlin.
They made three parts of that night, which they passed in great enjoyment, and discovered that Arthur’s wife was the sister of the son of the King of Lochlin, the lady who was carried away by the Half Slim Champion, and lost in a game of cards.