A group of men could be dimly discerned at the roadside. They had heeded not the approach of a single horseman as Robin swept past them, but as the central group came thundering on the men leapt into the adjoining wood.
"Halt!" cried Geoffrey, and he blew his signal to the advance-guard.
A man was evidently bound to a tree; at his feet was a half-extinguished fire.
Seizing a firebrand and swinging it into flame, the lad Tom (who had dismounted) held it close to the prisoner's face, then cut his bonds with his dagger. The man was a Jewish peddler, and his mutilated hands showed the cause of his cries of anguish, three of his fingers had been roughly cut away.
"Speak, man!" cried Geoffrey; "tell us quickly your case, for we may not tarry."
Then the peddler told them, in hurried words, that he had fallen into the hands of robbers, and that they were torturing him until he should tell them where he had concealed his pack.
"And where is your pack?" said Geoffrey.
The man hesitated, he cast a suspicious eye on Geoffrey.
"Put aside your fear, man," said Geoffrey; "we are Englishmen on service for King Philip, and we are in hot haste."
"At Busigney, my lord," said the peddler, regaining confidence.