as a young girl, tall,
with a fair skin and masses of long, very dark hair. Armed with a
spear, she fought savagely, but at the same time managed to keep an
eye on all the warrior's movements.

Suddenly from the rocks above came a shrill cry. To Grom's ears it
seemed like the voice of one of his dead children. At the end of a
long stroke, when his arms and the club were outstretched full length,
he glanced upwards in spite of himself. Instantly the club was
clutched by furious hands. He was pulled forward. At the same time one
of the enemy, ducking under his arms, plunged between his legs. And he
came down upon his face.

With a piercing scream, the tall girl bounded forth and stood across
him; and her spear stabbed his nearest assailant straight through the
flat and grinning face. So lightning swift was the rage of her attack
that for one vital moment it held the whole horde at bay. Then the
Hillmen swarmed forward irresistibly, battered down the foremost of
the foe, and dragged the fallen warrior back behind the lines to
recover. In half a minute he was once more at the front, fighting with
renewed fury, his head and back and shoulders covered with blood. And
close behind him stood the girl, breathless, clutching at her heart
and staring at him with wide eyes, unaware that the blood which
covered him was not his but her own.

Although to the invaders, their every charge broken and hurled back
with terrific slaughter, it must have seemed that their tall opponents
had all the best of the battle, to the wise old men and women up among
the rocks it was clear that their warriors were being rapidly worn
away as a bank is eaten by the waves. But now from a high ledge on the
right, where the wall of the pass was a sheer perpendicular, came two
shrill whistles. It was a signal which the Chief, now bleeding from
many wounds, had been waiting for. He roared a command, and his ranks,
after one surge forward to recover their wounded, gave back sullenly
till their front was more than half-way down the pass. With yells of
triumph the Bow-legs followed, trampling their dead and wounded, till
the bottle-neck was packed so tightly that there was no room to move.

From the left wall a ceaseless shower of stones came down upon their
heads; but from the right, for a few moments, only a rain of pebbles
and dust, which blinded them and choked their hideous, upturned
nostrils.

Above that dust a band of graybeards heaved upon a lever.