Talabor was standing at the window, bow in hand, when he presently drew back with a hasty movement.
"Quick!" he said in an undertone. "We must put out the fire!"
Dora rushed to it and began scattering and beating it out with a piece of wood.
"What is it?" she whispered; and Talabor whispered back, "I saw someone that I don't like the look of!" Then, holding up his forefinger, he added, "Perhaps there are only one or two; don't be afraid."
These few words, intended to be re-assuring, did not do much to allay Dora's fears, and she went up to Talabor, who was back at the window again, now that the fire was put out. Trembling, she stood beside him, while her cold hand fumbled in her pouch for the dagger which she carried with her.
It cannot be denied that at that moment, in spite of all her high spirit, Dora was terrified.
Thanks to the snow and the stars, Talabor could see clearly enough what was going on outside; and this is what he saw: two muffled figures hurrying towards the house, by the very same path which he himself had trodden only a short time before; tracking him by his deep footprints in all probability.
But a few moments after he had told Dora to put out the fire, one of the two figures, an unmistakable Tartar, was overtaken by the wolves, and there began one of those desperate conflicts between man and beast, which more often than not ended in the defeat of the former, firearms not being as yet in existence.
"Here! Help! Father!" shouted the one attacked. He had beaten down one wolf, with a sort of club, and was trying his utmost to defend himself against two others. At this appeal, made, by-the-bye, in the purest Magyar, the man in front hurried back to the help of his son.
"Surely he spoke Magyar!" whispered Dora.