child and his fearlessness.

"Turkil," he said.

"Well, Turkil--I am not Grendel. He fled when I came in here."

"Did you beat him?" asked the boy, with a sort of disappointment.

"Nay; but he disappeared when the hot coals went out," I said. "And now
I am hungry, can you find me aught to eat?" and, indeed, rested as I was
with the long sleep, I had waked sound in mind and body again, and
longed for food, and I think that finding this strange child here to
turn my thoughts into a wholesome channel, when first they began to stir
in me, was a mercy that I must ever be thankful for.

Turkil got up solemnly and went to the hearth. Thence he took an iron
cauldron, and hoisted it on the great round of tree trunk that served as
table in the midst of the hut.

"Dudda Collier left his supper when he fled. Wherefore if we eat it he
will think Grendel got it--and no blame to us," remarked the boy,
chuckling.

And when I thought how I had not a copper sceatta left me in the world,
I stopped before saying that I would pay him when he returned, and so
laughed back at the boy and fell to.

When we had finished, the cauldron, which had been full of roe deer
venison, was empty, and Turkil and I laughed at one another over it.