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"How!" cried Walkyn fiercely, "d'ye dare bid Walkyn stand, thou dog's meat? Must I flesh mine axe on thy vile carcase?" "Not till I feather a shaft in thee," growled Perkyn, "what would ye?" "Speak with Eric o' the Noose." "Aha, and what would ye with half-hung Eric, forsooth? Tostig's our chief, and Tostig's man am I. As for Eric "
Hereupon rose a hoarse murmur that grew and grew Then stood the man Perkyn forward, and scowling, pointed at Beltane with his spear. "Comrades!" he cried, "he hath slain Tostig!
Hereupon the outlaws stared upon Beltane and upon each other, and fumbled with their weapons as men that knew not their own minds, while Beltane, wiping sweat from him, leaned upon his axe and panted, with the three at his elbow alert and watchful, eager for fight; but Perkyn lay where he had fallen, very still and with his face hidden in the grass.
Now, all at once, Walkyn raised a warning hand, as from the shadow of those rocks, a hoarse voice challenged: "Stand!" cried the voice, "who goes?" "What, and is it thou, rogue Perkyn?" cried Walkyn, "art blind not to know me?" "Aye," growled the voice, "but blind or no, I see others with thee." "Good friends all!" quoth Walkyn. "Stand forth that I may see these friends o' thine!"
Drawing near, Beltane beheld a man in filthy rags who held a long bow in his hand with an arrow on the string, at sight of whom Roger muttered and Giles held his nose and spat. "Aha," growled the man Perkyn, peering under his matted hair, "I like not the looks o' these friends o' thine " "Nor we thine, foul fellow," quoth Giles, and spat again whole-heartedly.
A while stood Eric, head aslant, peering at Beltane, then, at a muttered word from Walkyn, he shook his head and beckoning the man Perkyn aside, led the way through a cleft in the rocks and up a precipitous path beyond; and as he went, Beltane saw him loosen sword in scabbard.
Had he ever written anything remotely partaking of the nature of a dramatic piece, it could at the most have been the words of the songs in some congratulatory royal pageant such as Lydgate probably wrote on the return of Henry V after Agincourt; though there is not the least reason for supposing Chaucer to have taken so much interest in the "ridings" through the City which occupied many a morning of the idle apprentice of the "Cook's Tale," Perkyn Revellour.
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