“A wolf!”
Jerome assured her with a nod.
“He never harms.”
“But wolves are evil beasts;” and Agnes still shrank, as Harun laid his trophy at his master’s feet.
“The only evil beasts are men.”
“I forget that he is a saint,” said Agnes, under breath, “and all things of the forest must obey him.”
So the partridge broiled beside the trout, whilst Harun dutifully waited for the bones. Jerome brought forth bread and cheese,—the simplest meal in Agnes’s life. What would my Lady Abbess at Bamberg think to have a beech leaf in her lap, in lieu of a fair white napkin from Flanders? But was it hunger which made all taste so good, or was it that a real saint had asked God’s blessing?
After the feast was over, Harun shambled away into the wood, and Agnes looked at the hermit, questioning.
“What am I to do?”
“Go where you will; follow down the stream, but stop when you come to the close gorge of the Dragon’s Dale. If you never quit the brook, you can never get lost. When you are weary, come back.”