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But the object for which they were travelling was different, although unknown, and the people they passed on the roads were unknown, and were yet people that they knew. They set out southwards from Tara into the Duffry of Leinster, and after some time they came into wild country and went astray. At last Becfola halted, saying: "I do not know where we are."
Nor do we know for certain where she went to. We do not even know her real name, for the name Becfola, "Dowerless" or "Small-dowered," was given to her as a nickname. This only is certain, that she disappeared from the world we know of, and that she went to a realm where even conjecture may not follow her.
He whispered: "Besides the young man, named Flann, who was not slain, there was another person present at the scene and the combat and the transgression of Sunday." "Who was that person?" said the alarmed monarch. The cleric spiked forward his chin, and then butted forward his brow. "It was the wife of the king," he shouted. "It was the woman called Becfola.
When the boar was cooked he ate of it and she had her share. Then he arose from the fire and walked away among the trees. Becfola followed, feeling ruefully that something new to her experience had arrived; "for," she thought, "it is usual that young men should not speak to me now that I am the mate of a king, but it is very unusual that young men should not look at me."
Sundered from her belongings, no woman is tranquil, her heart is not truly at ease, however her mind may function, so that under the broad sky or in the house of another she is not the competent, precise individual which she becomes when she sees again her household in order and her domestic requirements at her hand. Becfola pushed the door of the king's sleeping chamber and entered noiselessly.
But on the part of Becfola no similar tidings can be given. There are those whose happiness lies in ambition and station, and to such a one the fact of being queen to the High King of Ireland is a satisfaction at which desire is sated. But the mind of Becfola was not of this temperate quality, and, lacking Crimthann, it seemed to her that she possessed nothing.
"Alas," he replied, "if it has been a gallant deed it has not been a good one, for my three brothers are dead and my four nephews are dead." "Ah me!" cried Becfola, "why did you fight that fight?" "For the lordship of this island, the Isle of Fedach, son of Dali."
But, although Becfola was moved and horrified by this battle, it was in another direction that her interest lay; therefore she soon asked the question which lay next her heart: "Why would you not speak to me or look at me?" "Until I have won the kingship of this land from all claimants, I am no match for the mate of the High King of Ireland," he replied.
But the king spoke first, and what he said so astonished her that the explanation and reproach with which her tongue was thrilling fled from it at a stroke, and she could only sit staring and bewildered and tongue-tied. "Well, my dear heart," said the king, "have you decided not to keep that engagement?" "I I !" Becfola stammered.
And that reply was llke balm to the heart of Becfola. "What shall I do?" she inquired radiantly. "Return to your home," he counselled. "I will escort you there with your maid, for she is not really dead, and when I have won my lordship I will go seek you in Tara." "You will surely come," she insisted. "By my hand," quoth he, "I will come."
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