CHAPTER II
HOW KARL THE ARMORER TOOK THE SHINING KNIGHT’S TREASURE FROM AMONG THE OSIERS
The children had scarcely gone from the plateau when there came down the defile from the castle a figure unlike, in manner and attire, any that had but shortly before gone that road.
This was a tall, broad-shouldered man, clad in leather that was worn and creased, showing much hard wear. Over his left shoulder he carried two great swords in their scabbards, and his right hand gripped a long, stout staff, the iron point of which now and then rang out against the stone of the road as he thrust his great arm forward in rhythm with the huge stride of his long, leather-clad legs. The face beneath his hood was brown and weather-beaten, of long and thoughtful mold, but turned from overmuch sternness by the steady, kindly gleam of his gray eyes, pent in under great brows that met midway of his forehead, almost hiding the eyes from sight.
Had the children still been upon the plateau they would have known the figure for Karl of the forge in the forest below the village. He had been, as was often his errand, to the castle, this time with a breast-let that he had wrought for the baron, and was returning with the very sword wherewith the Herr Banf had made end of the shining knight, and with that blade also which had been the stranger’s own, to make good all hurts to their tempered edges and fit them for further service in battle.
He swung along the descending road until he came over against the place by the clump of osiers, where the children had seen the knight drop his burden. There he suddenly stopped, and leaned to listen. He thought that he heard a faint cry from the green tangle, so he waited a little space, to learn if it would sound again. Sure enough, it came a second time—a feeble, piteous moan, as of some young creature in distress and spent with long wailing.
“Now that is a pity,” thought Karl. “Some wee lamb has slipped off the cliff and fallen into the stream.”
He looked doubtfully at his burden, wondering what time it might take him to go to the rescue; but the little cry came again, so piteously that his soft heart would not let him wait longer. So, leaving the swords behind a boulder, he plunged in among the osiers; but he had gone but a step or two when he started back in dismay, for he had nearly trodden upon a yellow-haired babe who sat among the willows, looking up at him with great blue eyes in which the tears yet stood. Terror was in every line of the small face, but the baby made no further sound. He only looked earnestly up at the bearded, black-browed face bent over him, until he met the armorer’s eyes. Then he reached up his arms, and Karl stooped and raised him to his broad chest.
“Now what foul work is here, do you suppose?” he muttered to himself. “This is no chick from the village, nor from the castle either, I’ll be bound, or there’d have been hue and cry ere this.”
He pressed back the little face that had been buried against his neck, and surveyed it sharply. “What is thy name, little one?” he demanded at last.
At sound of the armorer’s voice the child again looked at him, and seemed not to understand the question until Karl had several times repeated it, saying the words slowly and plainly, when at last the baby said, with a touch of impatience: “Wulf! Wulf!” adding plaintively: “Wulf hungry!”
Then he broke down and sobbed tiredly on Karl’s big shoulder, so that the armorer was fain to hush him softly, comforting him with wonderful gentleness, while he drew from his own wallet a bit of coarse bread and gave it to the little fellow. The latter ate it with a sharp appetite, and afterward drank a deep draught from the leather cup which Karl filled from the stream. As he was drinking, a sound was heard as of some one passing on the road, whereupon the boy became suddenly still, looking at Karl in a way that made the armorer understand that for some reason it had been taught him that unknown sounds were a signal for silence.
“Ay?” thought Karl. “That’s naught like a baby. He’s been with hunted men, to learn that trick!”
When the child had eaten and drunk all he would, he settled down again in Karl’s arms, asking no questions—if, indeed, he could talk enough to do so, a matter of which the armorer doubted, for the little chap was but three or four years old at most. He seemed, however, well wonted to strangers, and to being carried from place to place; for he took it kindly when Karl settled him against his shoulder, throwing over him a sort of short cloak of travel-stained red stuff, in which he had been wrapped as he lay among the osiers, and stepped out upon the road. He first made sure that no one was in sight; then, regaining the swords, he walked hurriedly forward, minded to leave the highway as soon as he reached a little footpath he knew that led through the forest to his forge.
Good fortune favored him, and he gained the footpath without meeting any one; so that ere long the two were passing through the deep, friendly wood, the baby fast asleep in Karl’s arms, one small arm half encircling the armorer’s big neck, the other little fist clenched in the meshes of his grizzled beard. Karl stepped softly as any woman, lest his charge awaken and take fresh fright at the gloomy way before them, and at the tall, dark trees, whose branches met over the travelers’ heads.
Thus they fared, until at last they reached the forge, and the hut where the armorer dwelt alone. The way through the wood had been long, and the afternoon was well-nigh spent when Karl laid little Wulf upon a heap of skins just beyond the great chimney, and set himself to prepare food for himself and his charge.