Thereat the goodman, naked as he was, caught up his sword
and made at these murder-carles, and or ever they were ware of him he
had hewn down one and turned to face the other, who smote at him with
his steel axe and gave him a great wound on the shoulder, and
therewithal fled out at the open door and forth into the wood.
The Woodlander made no stay to raise the cry (there was no need, for
the hall was astir now from end to end, and men getting to their
weapons), but ran out after the felon even as he was; and, in spite
of his grievous hurt, overran him no long way from the house before
he had gotten into the thicket. But the man was nimble and strong,
and the goodman unsteady from his wound, and by then the others of
the household came up with the hue and cry he had gotten two more
sore wounds and was just making an end of throttling the felon with
his bare hands. So he fell into their arms fainting from weakness,
and for all they could do he died in two hours' time from that axe-
wound in his shoulder, and another on the side of the head, and a
knife-thrust in his side; and he was a man of sixty winters.
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