"Owen!" he cried. "Does he yet live? Surely we all thought him
dead, or else he had come hither to us when he was banished. I
loved him well in the old days, and glad I am that you are not
Morgan's charge. Tell me all about Owen. Is he home again?"
"Morgan is dead," I answered, feeling that here I had met with a
friend in all certainty. "And because of that, Owen is in his place
again, and I am here. It has all happened in this week, and to tell
you of it is to tell you all my trouble."
Now he was all impatience to hear, and I told him all that needed
to be told, until I came to the time when Owen was back at Norton
with the old king. Then he asked me some questions about matters
there, and in the midst of my answers sprang up.
"Why," he cried, "here I have forgotten the girl, and she ought to
be hearing all this, instead of sitting in the cold on the cliff.
She is Owen's goddaughter, moreover, and he was here only a little
time before he was banished. She can remember him well."
"Stay, though," he said, sitting down again. "There is your own
tale yet. Let us hear it. Maybe that is not altogether so
pleasant."
My own thought was that I was glad I might tell it without the
wondering eyes of the fair princess on me, being afraid in a sort
of way of having her think of me as the helpless sick man she had
pitied.
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