They burst through the bushes. Martin
Lightfoot, happily, heard them coming, and had just time to slip away
noiselessly, like a rabbit, to the other part of the cover.
The combat seemed at the first glance to be one between a grown man and a
child, so unequal was the size of the combatants. But the second look
showed that the advantage was by no means with Ironhook. Stumbling to and
fro with the broken shaft of a javelin sticking in his thigh, he vainly
tried to seize and crush Hereward in his enormous arms. Hereward,
bleeding, but still active and upright, broke away, and sprang round him,
watching for an opportunity to strike a deadly blow. The housecarles
rushed forward with yells. Alef shouted to the combatants to desist; but
ere the party could reach them, Hereward's opportunity had come. Ironhook,
after a fruitless lunge, stumbled forward. Hereward leapt aside, and
spying an unguarded spot below the corslet, drove his sword deep into the
giant's body, and rolled him over upon the sward. Then arose shouts of
fury.
"Foul play!" cried one.
And others taking up the cry, called out, "Sorcery!" and "Treason!"
Hereward stood over Ironhook as he lay writhing and foaming on the ground.
"Killed by a boy at last!" groaned he. "If I had but had my own sword,--my
Brain-biter which that witch stole from me but last night!"--and amid foul
curses and bitter tears of shame his mortal spirit fled to its doom.
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