ntinently vanished.

A thin scream sounded in Robin's ears, as a rush of flame mercifully
swallowed up this apparition: like as not, 'twas the sound of the fire
itself. The end had come, both to the unhappy foresters and Robin's
home. With a huge torrent of noise the roof of it crushed in, half
stifling the fire.

Then the flames seized full mastery; and amid a shower of sparks, the
red tongues licked and devoured the last of their prey.

* * * * *

Robin hastened to find his mother, that he might be relieved of his
anxiety and be rid for the moment of the sight of the awful catastrophe
of the fire. Warrenton and Stuteley rushed in together, at his command,
to try to save the two remaining foresters; but it was a very forlorn
hope. Warrenton in his just revenge had pushed things to their extreme
limits: Master Ford and all his band had paid the utmost penalty of
their failure to overcome this relentless old man.

Mistress Fitzooth had secured refuge and was now much calmer. She
embraced her son and wept over him in joy at this reunion. Robin could
see, however, that she was indeed much overwrought by these troubles.
She had not yet recovered from the loss of her husband.

They stayed with these poor people, who found room for them somehow,
out of sheer charity, for neither Robin nor the dame had any money. It
was a bitter business, in sooth: and next day Robin, finding his mother
far from well, humbled himself to beg assistance from the Squire. He
despatched the letter by Warrenton, and then patiently set himself to
wait a reply.

Also, he determined to seek an audience with the Prince. His home had
been burned, his small patrimony gone: he had now no means of keeping
himself and the dame from starvation save by living on another man's
bread.

The clerk, his one tried friend, was gone--no one knew where.

The Prince would surely yield him the right to be Ranger at Locksley in
his father's place! The house had been given to dead Hugh Fitzooth by
Henry, the King.

An uneasy feeling took possession of Robin, for Warrenton had defied and
overcome the Sheriff's man when he had been properly empowered to expel
mother and son from Locksley, and there were seven dead men, nay eight,
to be accounted for--and they were all of them King's Foresters.

* * * * *

Montfichet answered him by sending a purse of money and a curt letter
saying that Mistress Fitz