When Bear asks him about himself, Crispin doesn't know what to say; Bear helps him out by asking about his mother and the rest of his family.
Crispin has always been told that they all died in the Great Death, which is yet another cheerful name for the Black Death.
Bear says he escaped the plague by going north to the islands off the coast of Scotland.
He wonders why Crispin doesn't want to know more about who he is and who his family was, and finally asks how Crispin came to be declared a wolf's head.