"Aha!" cried Walkyn, pointing to divers of the slain that hampered their going, "these be Pertolepe's rogues--"
"Aye," quoth Roger, throwing back his mail-coif, "and yonder lie four, five--six of Sir Benedict's good fellows! It hath been a dour fight hereabouts--they have fought every yard of the way!"
"Forsooth," nodded Cnut, "Sir Benedict is ever most fierce when he retreats, look you." A while stood Beltane in that dark defile, the which, untouched as jet by the sun's level beams, struck dank and chill, a place of gloom and awful silence--so stood he, glancing from one still form to another, twice he knelt to look more closely on the dead and each time he rose thereafter, his brow was blacker and he shivered, despite his mantle.
"'Tis strange," said he, "and passing strange that they should all lie dead--not a living man among them! How think you Roger?"
"I think, lord, others have been here afore us. See you this knight now, his gorget loosed off--"
"O messire!" said a faint voice hard by, "if ye have any pity save me from the crone--for the love of Christ let not the hag slay me as she hath so many--save me!"
Starting round, Beltane espied a pale face that glared up at him from a thick furze-bush beside the way, a youthful face albeit haggard and drawn.
"Fear not!" said Beltane, kneeling beside the wounded youth, "thy life is safe from us. But what mean you by talk of hag and crone?"
"Ah, messire, to-day, ere the dawn, we fell upon Sir Benedict of Bourne--a seditious lord who hath long withstood Duke Ivo. But though his men were few they fought hard and gained the ford ahead of us. And in the fight I, with many others as ye see, was smitten down and the fight rolled on and left us here in the dust. As I lay, striving to tend my hurt and hearkening to the sighs and groans of the stricken, I heard a scream, and looking about, beheld an ancient woman--busied with her knife--slaying--slaying and robbing the dead--ah, behold her--with the black-haired archer--yonder!"
And verily Roger stepped forth of the underwood that clothed the steep, dragging a thing of rags and tatters, a wretched creature, bent and wrinkled, that mopped and mowed with toothless chaps and clutched a misshapen bundle in yellow, talon-like fingers, and these yellow fingers were splotched horribly with dark stains even as were the rags that covered her. She whined and whimpered querulously, mouthing inarticulate plaints and prayers as Roger haled her along, with Cnut and Walkyn, fierce and scowling, behind. Having brought her to Beltane, Roger loosed her, and wrenching away her bundle, opened it, and lo! a yellow-gleaming hoard of golden neck-chains, of rings and armlets, of golden spurs and belt-buckles, the which he incontinent scattered at Beltane's feet; whereon the gibbering creature screamed in high-pitched, cracked and ancient voice, and, screeching, threw herself upon the gold and fell to scrabbling among the dust with her gnarled and bony fingers; and ever as she raked and raked, she screeched harsh and high--a hateful noise that ended, of a sudden, in a wheezing sob, and sinking down, she lay outstretched and silent, her wrinkled face in the dust and a cloth-yard shaft transfixing her yellow throat.