'Stop!' a voice rang out from the darkness of the trees. 'Master Tax-collector,' it continued, 'tell your men to drop their weapons. Take the lead yourself.'

One of the horsemen, braver or more stupid than the rest, drew his sword and urged his horse forward. Two arrows took him full in the chest and sent him crashing to the dust. One archer had an arrow from his quiver. He was running for cover behind one of the carts. He never reached it. An arrow, steel-pointed and a yard long, caught him full in the cheek, going in one side of his face and out the other. The man tossed and turned, giving strangled cries, sending up white puffs of dust from the forest trackway.

'Enough!' Willoughby shouted despairingly. 'Your weapons – place them on the ground.'

He let go of the sweat-soaked hilt of his sword as a group of men, armed and hooded, dressed in Lincoln green, faces covered in black leather masks, stepped out of the trees. They moved soundlessly, like wraiths or those will-o'-the-wisps which hang above the marshes, so silent and terrible that Willoughby thought they were demons from the wild pack of Heme the Huntsman. But these were no ghosts. They were men of war, carrying sword, dagger, buckler, and each with a long bow and a quiver of arrows, either slung over their shoulders or strapped to their sides. More of them appeared at the edge of the forest. Willoughby scanned the line of trees. Forty or fifty assailants he counted anxiously to himself. God knew how many more lurked in the darkness. He chewed his lip nervously. He had how many? He looked back along the trackway; at least seven dead, only thirteen surviving. The man with the arrow through his face was still screaming. One of the outlaws moved across, grasped him by the hair and quickly slit the exposed throat.