'
'Yea, and what is the deed they have done?' said Gold-mane.
Said the carle: 'Thou knowest Penny-thumb's abode?'
'Yea surely,' said Face-of-god; 'fair are the water-meadows about it;
great gain of cheese can be gotten thence.'
'Hast thou been within the house?' said the carle.
'Nay,' said Gold-mane.
Then spake Penny-thumb: 'Within is scant gear: we gather for others
to scatter; we make meat for others' mouths.'
The carle laughed: 'Sooth is that,' said he, 'that there is little
gear therein now; for the strong-thieves have voided both hall and
bower and byre.'
'And when was that?' said Face-of-god.
'The night before last night,' said the carle, 'the door was smitten
on, and when none answered it was broken down.'
'Yea,' quoth Penny-thumb, 'a host entered, and they in arms.'
'No host was within,' said the carle, 'nought but Penny-thumb and his
sister and his sister's son, and three carles that work for him; and
one of them, Rusty to wit, was the worst man of the hill-country.
These then the host whereof the goodman telleth bound, but without
doing them any scathe; and they ransacked the house, and took away
much gear; yet left some.
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