by David Ker
CHAPTER XV
A Night Alarm
"Well, friend Gaspard, if these English wolves have the better of us inthe open field, we are as good as they when it comes to defendingtowns. Six months, and better, have the rogues lain before our town,and not got it yet."
So spoke a Breton soldier to his comrade, as they stood on the walls ofRennes on a gloomy November evening in 1353, looking down on thecountless white tents that shimmered ghost-like through the deepeninggloom, and the lights that spangled the blackness like huge glow-worms.
Amid the great struggle between France and England, the rival claimantsof the Duchy of Brittany, Charles of Blois and Earl de Montfort, hadgot up a little private war of their own. Most of the leading Bretonknights (including Bertrand du Guesclin) supported Charles's cause,while England sided with the Earl; and Rennes being the most importanttown that held out for Charles, the English were doing their best totake it, though as yet in vain.
"They will have the town sooner or later, though, Pierre," said theelder soldier, despondingly; "for ere long we shall have nought to eat,unless we can chew pike-staves like mutton-bones, and swallowarrow-heads for New Year cakes!"
"Well, these English have no cause to crow over us on that score,"cried his more hopeful comrade; "for, thou know'st, yon Picard whoescaped from them to us yester-eve, brought word that the thieves hadwell-nigh spent their stores, and were at their wits' end to replenishthem."
"It will end, then, in a match of who can starve the longest," saidGaspard, with a grim smile; "and at that game I fear them nought, formethinks we Bretons can hold out without food as long as any man alive."
"Ay, truly; and these cold nights that are coming will try the Englishrogues hard, encamped as they be in the open field."
"I fear it will ne'er come as far as that," put in a third man, who hadjust come up. "Heard ye not, lads, yon great shouting in the Englishcamp but now? and know ye what it meant?"
"What meant it?" asked both at once.
"Marry, it meant that yon movable tower of theirs is at last ready toattack our walls, and by to-morrow's sunrise it will be upon us. Evenso said a dog of an English archer who stood nigh the wall, and calledto me but now in scorn, 'Make room in your sty, ye Breton piglings; thegreat sow is coming.'"
His hearers eyed each other in blank dismay, for in that age theseformidable engines were the terror of every besieged garrison. Theinvention of gunpowder, though more than half a century old, had as yetmade little difference in war; and not till a century later did thefall of Constantinople before the Turk's breaching-cannon show the fullpower of the new artillery. The chief mode of attack was still withhigh wooden towers, which (protected from fire by a cover of raw hides,and from stones by their sloping roofs and solid build) were pushedclose up to the city walls; and while the men who filled the upperstory sprang on the ramparts sword in hand, the sappers in the lowerone made a breach or beat in a gate, thus combining both modes ofassault, mine and escalade.
"If this be so," said Gaspard, "may God have mercy on us, for we shallfind none from man."
He spoke too truly. In that iron age, though the lives of knights andnobles might be spared for ransom, those of common soldiers were heldcheap as flies; and the slaughter of the whole garrison was in suchcases so completely a matter of course, that the defenders of thedoomed city already counted themselves dead men.
"There is no hope for us, in truth," growled the third man, "for fivehundred men (and we number but that) cannot make good such a circuit ofwall against five thousand. We are lost, unless aid come from without,and I see not how that can be."
"It cannot," said Pierre, whose set, grim face, lit for a moment by theglare of the watch-fires below, showed how utterly he had given himselfup for lost. "There is no army of friends at hand, and, without an armyto back him, there lives but one man in Brittany this day who couldbreak through yon English host, and he is far away."
"Thou mean'st our Bertrand du Guesclin. Would to Heaven he were here,for he alone would be worth an army."
"Ay, that would he!" cried the third Breton, forgetting his own perilin his simple, honest exultation at his countryman's prowess. "Well maythey call him 'The Grim Knight,' for grim hath he truly been to hiscountry's foes. Heard ye what he did at the siege of Dinan, a yearagone? He was returning with his men from a sally against the Englishcamp, and was already nigh to the town gate, having broken his waythrough their host, and all seemed safe for him, when suddenly hemissed from his neck a rosary that he ever bare, the gift, men say, ofthe fair lady to whom he is betrothed, Tiphaine de Raguenel, whom theycall 'the Fairy.'"
"And what did he?" asked both listeners at once.
"What did he? Why, he turned his horse, and back he dashed into themidst of the pursuing English. One of their archer-knaves had alreadyfound the chain, and snatched it up; but scarce had he touched it, whenhis head was swept from his shoulders, and Messire Bertrand, turning onthe others, smote them down with his axe as the hail beats down thecorn. But the knaves laid on load stoutly, and sore was the fray, whenup came one who seemed a captain among them, and cried, 'Shame on ye,lads! let the gallant gentleman pass free! for so good a knightdeserveth all the honour we can pay him.' So the fray was stayed, andour Bertrand came safe to the town."
"Why, then," cried Pierre, in surprise, "there is some courtesy evenamong these English! But, having warred so long in France, belike theyhave learned good manners here."
"Doubtless," said Gaspard; "but we, at least, have no mercy to hopefrom them. Commend your souls to God, comrades, for we shall never, Itrow, see another sun go down."
The same gloomy conviction was in the mind of every man in that doomedfortress; and, even in an age when men cast away their own lives orthose of others as lightly as children their broken toys, the mostreckless of these rough soldiers could not be wholly unmoved by thethought that, strong and bold as they stood there, full of life andhealth and daring, they would all, ere another sun went down, be lyingcold and dead. Many a hard hand, still red with recent slaughter, wasuplifted to heaven that night in heart-felt supplication; and many arude man-at-arms strove to call to mind some long-forgotten prayer.
Slowly and wearily the dismal night wore on, and as dawn drew nigh, thesentinels on the walls, looking toward the English camp, strained theireyes and ears for any sign of the fatal assault that was to end all.The moon had set, and the only light was from the dying watch-fires;but their faint glow sufficed to show to a keen-eyed young soldier onthe tower above the Dinan Gate a strange and ghostly sight.
At the eastern angle of the enemy's camp burned a fire larger andbrighter than the rest, and as he gazed, its blaze was suddenlyobscured--then left clear again--then obscured once more; and thus itkept vanishing and reappearing by turns for several minutes together,as if a long train of shadows were passing between it and himself.
At that unearthly hour, and in that superstitious age, such anapparition would have unnerved the boldest man; but even this was notall. Though these ghostly riders were numerous enough to have madetheir hoof-tramp on this rough and rocky ground plainly heard, even atthat distance, amid the tomb-like silence of night, not a sound reachedthe strained ear of the sentry, who crossed himself tremulously,convinced that what he saw was not of this world.
But the next moment brought him some encouragement; for, as the shadowytrain drew nearer, an English sentinel's hoarse voice was heardchallenging it, and another voice replying with the counter-sign.
This did not sound very ghostly, and the bold Breton, reflecting that aspirit would have no need of pass-words, was beginning to feel morecomposed, when a new and disturbing idea came to trouble him. As thesestrange riders were not ghosts, they must be English reinforcementscoming up for the final assault; and this would make the case of thedefenders more hopeless than ever.
Hardly had the thought struck him, when it was put to flight, and hissuperstitious terrors revived in full force, by
a new and startlingturn of this strange adventure.
The shadowy horsemen, dimly seen by the faint light of the dying fires,had all this while been gliding nearer and nearer to the town,noiselessly as ever. The sentry, watching them keenly, was justbeginning to wonder if there could be a traitor within the fortress,and if these night-prowlers were advancing on it in the hope of havingits gate opened to them, when, all at once, the foremost rider sankinto the earth before the very eyes of the astounded watcher; and allthe rest vanished in the same way, man by man, till not one wasleft--and all this without the slightest sound.
The sturdy Breton trembled like a leaf; but the man who just then cameup to take his place hardly noticed how silently he slunk away,supposing him merely tired and sleepy, as was quite natural.
The new-comer, however, was fated to be as much startled in his turn.
Hardly had he begun to pace up and down, when a shadowy rider seemed toissue from the ground, silently as a dream, a little to his left; andthen, one by one, the ghostly horsemen rose through the earth again asnoiselessly as they had vanished into it!
For a moment, the new sentry was as much scared as his comrade; but hewas a more experienced soldier, and the true explanation of thisprodigy soon suggested itself to him. He called to mind that this partof the English camp was traversed by a deep and narrow ravine, throughwhich the seeming phantoms must have made their way; and as for theirsilent movements, the veteran knew that horse-hoofs may sometimes bemuffled!
Then came a cheering thought. Had these men belonged to the besieginghost, they would have had no need for such caution; they must befriends, trying to reach the town without being detected!
Filled with joy at such unhoped-for help in their sorest need, he lostno time in announcing his discovery; and several officers hastened tothe spot, just as a single form detached itself from the shadowy train,and rode close up to the gate.
"Open, I pray," he whispered; "we bring you aid and food."
"And perchance death too," said a veteran officer, warily. "How know wethat ye are not betraying us? The English knaves have disguised themthus ere now. Till we know more of you, ye enter not here."
"Dally not, in Heaven's name! life and death are on every moment!" saidthe other vehemently, though still in a subdued tone. "I speak truth, Ivow it by St. Anne of Auray! Call quickly your commandant, Sir Godefroide Kerimel, if ye will not believe me."
But there was no need, for the commandant was already on the spot.
"Who art thou who wouldst speak with me?" he cried, looking keenly overthe ramparts at the dim form below.
"Yvon de Laconnet," said the stranger; "thou hast heard of me, belike.Our captain bade me tell thee, as a token that we be true men, that wehave with us 'Ar fol goet.'"
Most men would have seen no meaning in these Breton words, which implymerely "The fool of the forest;" but to De Kerimel and his men thestrange phrase was like an electric shock.
"Open the gate!" he cried, "and praised be God, who hath sent such aidin our need!"
The gate was opened, and in filed a hundred and fifty stoutmen-at-arms, each with a bag of meal at his saddle-bow, a welcome sightto the famished garrison.
De Laconnet told in few words how he and his men, on their way to thetown, had met an English raiding party a hundred strong, and, fallingon them by surprise, had cut them off to a man. Assuming as a disguisethe red crosses of their slain foes, and getting the pass-word from oneof their number, who had stolen in among the English after dark tolearn it, they had come safe through the besieging army with theirprecious burden.
"But where is _he_, then?" asked Sir Godefroi, keenly scanning the longfile of riders as they passed.
De Laconnet replied in a whisper so low as to be barely audible; but itseemed to startle the other like a thunder-clap.
"Now, may God guard him!" cried De Kerimel, crossing himself, "fornever was such peril dared by mortal man!"
In truth, great as were the dangers that this chosen band had braved,they were nothing to the terrific peril which their leader was thenfacing. For that leader was one who thought nothing done while anythingremained to do; and, where others would have been content to bring foodand help to the hard-pressed fortress, he aimed at nothing less thanthe destruction of the formidable engine before which it was about tofall.
Tall, gaunt, black, loomed against the star-lit sky (the goldenspangles of which were just paling at the approach of dawn), the hugemovable tower, so much dreaded by the defenders. At each corner of theplatform on which it stood, the wary English leader had planted asentinel; for he knew to his cost the daring of the besieged, and fullyexpected a desperate sally that night to attack the fatal engine.
But no sally came; and the four guards, drowsy with cold and watching,were yawning and rubbing their numbed hands, and doing their best tokeep awake, when a hoof-tramp was heard, and up rode a single horseman,wearing the red cross of England.
"Hold, and give the word!" cried the foremost sentry, on the alert in amoment, while his comrade drew up to him, all ready for action.
"St. George for Guienne!" replied the new-comer at once. "Ye keep goodwatch, lads; but methinks there is little need of it now."
"Why so?" asked both at once, while the other two guards came roundfrom the farther side of the tower to listen.
"Marry, the only foe within reach is already overthrown. Ye know wewent forth on a foray yester-morn; and our hap was to light on a wholetroop of these dainty Frenchmen, riding in hot haste toward the town,and every man with a bag of meal slung to his saddle, thinking beliketo catch us napping, and get through to the hungry town with theirbaker's ware!"
The listening Englishmen gave an angry growl.
"But they reckoned without their host, for we fell upon them in rightEnglish fashion, and when we got among these meal-carriers, St. George!but we baked them a cake that they little relished! None escaped savethe few we spared for ransom; and I have here two good war-steeds sentby our captain as a gift to stout Sir Nicholas, whom Heaven longpreserve to command us!"
The narrator spoke loudly and rapidly, almost as if trying to drownsome tell-tale sound; and so he was, though it would have needed a veryquick ear to catch, amid the timbers that supported the formidabletower, a faint scraping, like the working of a well-oiled saw!
But even had they heard it, the English would hardly have heeded it, sotaken up were they with the news of the supposed victory, and the noblehorses that were its trophies, around which they pressed with a trueEnglish interest in a horse.
"They be goodly beasts, in truth," said one; "but I trow we have many abetter nag in merry Yorkshire."
"Nay, there thou speak'st without warrant, Hal," cried a second. "Seethis black, what bone and sinew he hath! and what breadth too! Marry,he might bear Guy of Warwick, or Bevis of Hampton, armed at all points!"
Just then a faint clink, as of metal, was heard from the engine; andthe strange horseman started slightly, and shot a nervous glance at it,unseen by the rest.
"Hark! what sound was that?" cried an archer.
"A screw started in the framework, belike," said another. "It will makemore noise ere long, when set against yon walls."
All laughed hoarsely at the grim jest; but the laughers little dreamedwhat was going on within a few feet of where they stood!