"Halt, friends!" cries I. "Here is harm for no man that meaneth none. Nay,
rather do I give ye joyous welcome in especial such of you as be English,
for I am an Englishman and very solitary."

But now (and even as I spake them thus gently) I espied the fugitive on his
knees, saw him whip up one of my muskets (all in a moment) and fire or
ever I might stay him. The shot was answered by a cry and out from the
underbrush a man reeled, clasping his hurt and so fell and lay a-groaning.
At this his comrades let fly their shot in answer and made off forthwith.
Deserted thus, the wounded man scrambled to hands and knees and began to
creep painfully after his fellows, beseeching their aid and cursing them by
turns. Hearing a shrill laugh, I turned to see the fugitive reach for and
level another of my weapons at this wounded wretch, but, leaping on him
as he gave fire, I knocked up the muzzle of the piece so that the bullet
soared harmlessly into the air. Uttering a strange, passionate cry, the
fugitive sprang back and snatching out an evil-looking knife, made at me,
and all so incredibly quick that it was all I could do to parry the blow;
then, or ever he might strike again, I caught that murderous arm, and, for
all his slenderness and seeming youth, a mighty desperate tussle we made of
it ere I contrived to twist the weapon from his grasp and fling him panting
to the sward, where I pinned him beneath my foot. Then as I reached for
the knife where it had fallen, he cried out to me in his shrill, strangely
clear voice, and with sudden, fierce hands wrenched apart the laces and
fine linens at his breast:

"Stay!" cried he. "Don't kill me--you cannot!"

Now looking down on him where he lay gasping and writhing beneath my foot,
I started back all in a moment, back until I was stayed by the rampire, for