Raymond stopped short and listened, too. Yes; there was certainly some
tumult going on a little distance ahead of them. The brothers
distinguished the sound of human voices raised in shrill piercing cries,
and with that sound was mingled the fierce baying note that they had
heard too often in their lives to mistake at any time.

"It is some traveller attacked by wolves!" cried the brothers in a
breath, and without a single thought of their own peril the gallant boys
tore headlong through the dark wood to the spot whence the tumult proceeded.

Guided by the sound of shouts, cries, and the howling of the beasts, the
brothers were not long in nearing the scene of the strife.

"Shout aloud!" cried Gaston to his brother as they ran. "Make the
cowardly brutes believe that a company is advancing against them. It is
the best, the only chance. They will turn and fly if they think there be
many against them."

Raymond was not slow to act upon this hint. The next moment the wood
rang again to the shouts and calls of the brothers, voice answering to
voice till it seemed as though a score of men were approaching. The
brothers, moreover, knew and used the sharp fierce call employed by the
hunters of the wolves in summoning their dogs to their aid -- a call
that they knew would be heard and heeded by the savage brutes, who would
well know what it meant. And in effect the artifice was perfectly
successful; for ere they had gained the spot upon which the struggle had
taken place, they heard the breaking up of the wolf party, as the
frightened beasts dashed headlong through the coverts, whilst their
howling and barking died away in the distance, and a great silence
succeeded.

"Thank Heaven for a timely rescue!" they heard a voice say in the
English tongue; "for by my troth, good Malcolm, I had thought that thou
and I would not live to tell this tale to others. But where are our good
friends and rescuers? Verily, I have seen nothing, yet there must have
been a good dozen or more. Light thy lantern, an thou canst, and let us
look well round us, for by the mass I shall soon think we have been
helped by the spirits of the forest."

"Nay, fair sir, but only by two travellers," said Gaston, advancing from
the shadow of the giant trees, his brother closely following him. "We
are ourselves benighted in this forest, having by some mischance lost
our road to Castres, which we hoped to have sighted ere now. Hearing the
struggle, and the s