They answered with a long-drawn yelp of hatred and, stirred to madness by the spouting blood of their comrade, closed around Hugh in a rancid, furry tangle of knotted limbs and shifting knives. In a minute he was down in the dust of the road, and they were falling over him, cutting each other in their fury, snarling and gnashing their teeth, screaming curses and scratching and pounding when their knives were useless.
Hugh fought as best he could, twisting and turning behind their bodies to dodge the knife-thrusts at throat and face, shortening his sword to fend off blows under his hauberk. But the struggle was hopeless. He knew he must weary and falter, and in that moment die. But the realisation steeled him to fresh efforts. He tore loose from a man who grappled his sword-arm, stabbed into the groin of a second, and shook off a third who pinned his legs. He was almost free, and staggered to his feet—only to be overwhelmed again under a wave of sweating, evil faces. Filthy hands groped at his throat; a knife flashed in his eyes.
"Edith," he gasped. "St. James! My soul——"
There was a rattle of hoofs on the roadway, a sharp cry and clang of steel.
"Christ and the Sepulchre! Forward! Out upon you, knaves!"
The greenwood men turned like bayed wolves on the rescuer, but he hacked a path through them and won to Hugh's side. He was a quaint contrast to that ring of forest outlaws, tired in a flaring surcoat of bright colours over silvered mail, his red cap peaked by a trailing feather. He was slim in build, with a dark, hawk-nosed face and eyes that smouldered on far-away visions. But what caught Hugh's eye at once was the sword that he wielded so skilfully, a strange, curved blade, wholly unlike the straight sword of Western Europe. In his left hand, too, the stranger carried a dagger, long and somewhat curved, and this served him as a shield to parry the blows that rained upon him.
As Hugh scrambled to his feet, the leader of the outlaws leaped in to close quarters, endeavouring to strike behind the rescuer's back and catch Hugh unawares. But the stranger warded him off, and in retaliation sliced him down the arm with a peculiar side-long stroke.
"Hast gained your breath, lord?" he asked Hugh casually. "Ay? Then shall we charge this rabble?"
Hugh nodded, and the two sprang forward, side by side, blades whistling. The stouter of the greenwood men stood their ground until the steel bit flesh. Then they scattered and ran.
Hugh paused at the wood's edge.