For a long while none of the aliens came anear them; but at last, when the battle was at its fiercest, rode up three men leading two unbacked horses, and they were of the mien and in the gear of the Red Skinners; and the Carline stood in the door to meet them, and she spake to them and said: “What will ye warriors? Why are ye not in the battle with your fellows?” Said one: “Because our errand is here and not there: neither are those men our fellows. We be the servants of that goodly merchant who guested here a while ago, and would have bought the maiden within there in all honour, and ye rewarded his good will with scorn, and mocks and japes and scurvy dealing. Wherefore he hath set these reivers on your folk, and hath sent us along with them to look to you. And two-fold is our errand, to
