"Look!" he cried, pointing with quivering finger, "one dead and one sore hurt--Saint Giles save us, what have ye done? These be Sir Pertolepe's foresters--behold his badge!"
But Beltane laughed, fierce-eyed.
"How, bowman, dost blench before a badge, then? I was too meek and gentle for thee ere this, but now, if thou'rt afraid--get you gone!"
"Art surely mad!" quoth Giles. "The saints be my witness here was no act of mine!" So saying he turned away and hasted swift-footed through the green. Now when the bowman was gone, Beltane turned him to the hairy man who yet kneeled beside the body of the woman. Said he: "Good fellow, is there aught I may do for thee?"
"Wife and child--and dead!" the man muttered, "child and wife--and dead! A week ago, my brother--and now, the child, and then the wife! Child and wife and brother--and dead!" Then Beltane came, minded to aid him with the woman, but the hairy man sprang before her, swinging his great staff and muttering in his beard; therefore Beltane, sick at heart, turned him away. And, in a while, being come to the road once more, he became aware that he yet grasped his sword and beheld its bright steel dimmed here and there with blood, and, as he gazed, his brow grew dark and troubled.
"'Tis thus have I made beginning," he sighed, "so now, God aiding me, ne'er will I rest 'till peace be come again and tyranny made an end of!"
Then, very solemnly, did my Beltane kneel him beside the way and lifting the cross hilt of his sword to heaven kissed it, and thereafter rose. And so, having cleansed the steel within the earth, he sheathed the long blade and went, slowfooted, upon his way.