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"Aha!" cried Walkyn, pointing to divers of the slain that haues--"

"Aye," quoth Roger, throwing back his ood 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 bealoo from one still form to another, twice he knelt to look more closely on the dead and each time he rose thereafter, his broas blacker and he shivered, despite his e that they should all lie dead--not a living er?"

"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 saveslayround, 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 fro and crone?"

"Ah, messire, to-day, ere the dae fell upon Sir Benedict of Bourne--a seditious lord who hath long withstood Duke Ivo But though his ained the ford ahead of us And in the fight I, with ht rolled on and left us here in the dust As I lay, striving to tend roans of the stricken, I heard a screa about, beheld an ancient wo 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 moith toothless chaps and clutched a ers, and these yellow fingers were splotched horribly with dark stains even as were the rags that covered her She whined and whi 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-gleaolden spurs and belt-buckles, the which he incontinent scattered at Beltane's feet; whereon the gibbering creature screah-pitched, cracked and ancient voice, and, screeching, threw herself upon the gold and fell to scrabbling aers; 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