The dean, having received the messengers, took special care that the knowledge of their arrival should be kept, if possible, from the ears and eyes of Adam de Dutton, who happened for several days at that season to be hunting in the forest, where a mighty slaughter of game—­wolves, bears, and such like—­was the result; in which dangerous pastime, Geoffery, the dean’s only son, acted a distinguished part.  This bold adventurer was accounted the most skilful hunter in the whole range of these vast forests, where the venison was so strictly kept that the life of a man was held in but little estimation, comparatively, with the care and preservation of a beast.

The Deans of Whalley, as we have before seen, were mighty hunters in those days; and a wild and picturesque story is told in Dugdale’s Mon.  Angl.. v. i., to which we have before alluded—­to wit, that the great-grandfather of the present incumbent, Liwlphus Cutwolph, cut off a wolf’s tail whilst hunting, from which he acquired this surname.  Geoffery inherited a more than ordinary passion for the chase.  With his bow and hunting-spear he had been known to spend many days in these deep and trackless recesses, where the feet of man rarely trod, and the wild roe and the eagle had their almost inaccessible haunts.  Adam was often his only companion; the seneschal’s partiality for the sport having rendered these dissimilar spirits more akin than their nature had otherwise permitted.

On the evening of a sultry day Ulphilas had thrown himself on his couch, when, without warning or intimation, the Dean of Whalley stood beside him.

“The holy hermit hath betaken himself early to his repose.  How fareth he in this hard cell?  ’Tis long since we have met.”

“Peradventure it might have been longer, had not news travelled to thine ear touching the safety of the Fitz-Eustace and his speedy arrival,” said the hermit, without so much as turning his eyes toward his visitor.  Robert de Whalley stood silent and aghast.  This was a direct and unequivocal testimony to the prescience of the good father, for to no ears but his own had the tidings been communicated.

“Thou knowest of his return?”

“Yes, ere the knowledge was thine,” said the hermit carelessly.

“There is little use in secrecy where the very walls possess a tongue; and seeing that the first part of mine errand is known, it may be thou art as well instructed in the latter, which is the true purport of my visit.”

“I am,” replied the other quickly, now for the first time fixing his eyes on the intruder, “and of the issue too, I trow.”

“Ah!” said the dean, with a long-drawn exclamation of surprise, and a sudden gasp as though he would have held the secret more tightly to his bosom; “and who”—­

“Nay, thou art but obeying the impulse of thy nature,” said the hermit, musing.  “The brutes ye hunt obey their common instinct—­and thou—­Yet the ravening wolf and the cunning fox ye follow, and worry to their death.”