I didn’t have to wait. He breathed one long breath. Without a sign of warning, he laid his weight on his hands. He leaped into the air. His huge body came at me like a mountain. He crossed the table without once touching it. I made to jump aside. I was too late for I never counted on such agility. He landed on his feet and grasped me, as I was turning away, by the arms. He drew them back and pinned them to my side. With a twist he threw me to the ground. He raised his heavy fist in the air. I looked up with an expression on my face of terror and despair. I was certain my end was come, when I heard a shout at the door. A flash of white like the wing of a bird passed between him and me. The fist never came down, for an arrow was sticking in the flesh of his upper arm shaking and swaying like a reed in the wind.
I scrambled to my feet. With much blinking I looked about. I saw the skirts of the nightgown of the old landlord pass through the kitchen door. On his heels followed Pierre with a glance back into the room. He was white from fear and pain. He was holding the arm that was wounded, in the other. But there was a look in his face that reminded me of an animal that is angry enough to devour alive its prey. I was sure that if he could have gotten his hands on me then, he would have torn me limb from limb.
I turned towards the door. On the threshold stood two archers clad in hunting costumes of light green. The one who had shot Pierre was drawing a fresh arrow from his quiver while the other was searching every nook and cranny for signs of a hidden foe.
“There were two of you who came here together?” he demanded.
I was more surprised than they for I noticed now that Charles and the man with whom he was fighting were gone. But before I could answer he came running from the trees that grew about the place and halted at the door. His face was drawn as tight as a drum and covered with dirt and sweat. In his hand he held the knife which I had first seen in the grasp of his foe.
“He drew me out into the woods,” he explained. “He was the toughest man I ever met.”
Then I bethought me of Pierre and the old landlord.
“They will escape!” I cried. “They will go and bring others of their kind. They’ll——”
The archer waved his hand.
“Let them go,” he said. “Let them bring twenty. There are a dozen of my followers already on the way here——”