Just then up ran four of the Earl's men, and told them ill tidings; for they said they had found three men slain in the field, and Thrand wounded to the death.
"Who can have done this?" says the Earl.
"Killing-Hrapp," they say.
"Then he must have burnt down the shrine," says the Earl.
They said they thought he was like enough to have done it.
"And where may he be now?" says the Earl.
They said that Thrand had told them that he had laid down in a thicket.
The Earl goes thither to look for him, but Hrapp was off and away. Then the Earl set his men to search for him, but still they could not find him. So the Earl was in the hue and cry himself, but first he bade them rest a while.
Then the Earl went aside by himself, away from other men, and bade that no man should follow him, and so he stays a while. He fell down on both his knees, and held his hands before his eyes; after that he went back to them, and then he said to them, "Come with me".
So they went along with him. He turns short away from the path on which they had walked before, and they came to a dell. There up sprang Hrapp before them, and there it was that he had hidden himself at first.