A Monk of Fife<br />Being the Chronicle Written by Norman Leslie of Pitcullo, Concerning Marvellous, Andrew Lang [speld decodable readers TXT] 📗

man came forth against them, which was marvel.  And on the Wednesday, the Maid, with many knights, rode forth two leagues, and met the Bastard of Orleans and all the array from Blois, and all the flocks and herds that were sent to Orleans by the good towns.  Right beneath the forts of the English they rode and marched, with chanting of hymns, priests leading the way, but none dared meddle with them.  Yet a child might have seen that now or never was the chance: howbeit Talbot and Glasdale and Scales, men well learned in war, let fire not even a single cannon.  It may be that they feared an attack of the Orleans folk on their bastilles, if they drew out their men.  For, to tell the plain truth, the English had not men-at-arms enough for the task they took in hand; but they oft achieve much with but little force, and so presume the more, sometimes to their undoing.  And, till the Maid came, ten of them could chase a hundred of the French.

So the Maid returned, leading the army, and then, being very weary, she went into her chamber, and lay down on a couch to sleep, her esquire, D’Aulon, also resting in the room, where were the lady and a daughter of the house, one Charlotte Boucher.  There was I, devising idly with her page, Louis de Coutes, a boy half Scots by birth, and good-brother to Messire Florent d’Illiers, who had married his sister.  But alas! he was more French than Scots, and later he left the Maid.  But then we were playing ourselves at the door of the house, and all was still, the men-at-arms reposing, as we deemed, after their march.  Then suddenly the Maid ran forth to us, her face white and her eyes shining, and cried to Louis de Coutes, in great anger—

“Wretched boy, the blood of France is being shed, and you told me no word of it!”

“Demoiselle,” said he, trembling, “I wotted not of it.  What mean you?”

And I also stood in amaze, for we had heard no sound of arms.

“Go, fetch my horse,” she said, and was gone.

I went with him, and we saddled and bridled a fresh courser speedily; but when we reached the door, she stood there already armed, and sprang on the horse, crying for her banner, that De Coutes gave her out of the upper window.  Then her spurs were in her horse’s side, and the sparks flying from beneath his hoofs, as she galloped towards St. Loup, the English fort on the Burgundy road.  Thither we followed her, with what speed we might, yet over tardily; and when we came through crowds of people, many bearing the wounded on litters, there was she, under the wall of that fort, in a rain of arrows, holding up her banner, and crying on the French and Scots to the charge.  They answered with a cry, and went on, De Coutes and I pressing forward to be with them; but ere ever we could gain the fosse, the English had been overwhelmed, and, for the more part, slain.  For, as we found, the French captains had commanded an attack on St. Loup, and had told the Maid no word of it, whether as desiring to win honour without her, or to spare her from the peril of the onslaught, I know not.  But their men were giving ground, when by the monition of the saints, as I have shown, she came to them and turned the fray.

Of the English, as I said, most were slain, natheless certain men in priests’ raiment came forth from the Church of St. Loup, and very humbly begged their lives of the Maid, who, turning to D’Aulon, her esquire, bade him, with De Coutes and me, and such men as we could gather, to have charge of them and be answerable for them.

So, while the French were plundering, we mustered these priests orderly together, they trembling and telling their beads, and we stood before them for their guard.  False priests, I doubt, many of them were, Englishmen who had hastily done on such holy robes as they found in the church of St Loup.  Now Louis de Coutes, being but a boy, and of a mad humour, cried—

“‘Cucullus non facit monachum!’ Good sirs, let us see your reverend tonsures.”

With that he twitched the hood from the head of a tall cordelier, who, without more ado, felled him to the earth with his fist.

The hood was off but for a flash of time, yet I saw well the shining wolf’s eyes and the long dark face of Brother Thomas.  So, in the pictures of the romance of Renard Fox, have I seen Isengrim the wolf in the friar’s hood.

“Felon and traitor!” I cried, and drawing my sword, was about to run him through the body, when my hand was stunned by a stroke, and the sword dropped from it.  I turned, in great anger, and saw the Maid, her sword in her hand, wherewith she had smitten me flatlings, and not with the edge.

“Knave of a Scot,” she cried, “wouldst thou strike a holy man and my prisoner?  Verily they say well that the Scots are all savages.  Begone home, till I speak with the captains about thy case!  And for these holy men,” she said to D’Aulon, in a soft voice, “see that they are safely housed and ministered to in the Church of Monseigneur St. Aignan.”

With that I shrank back like a beaten hound, and saw the Maid no more that night, as fearing her wrath.  So was I adread and out of all comfort.  But, when first I might, I sought D’Aulon and told him all the tale of Brother Thomas, and all the evil I knew of him, as well as I could, and I showed him wherefore I had sought to slay the man, as forsworn and a traitor, who had manifestly fled to the English, being by his doggish nature the enemy of the Maid.  I so wrought with him, though he was weary, and would scarce listen to my tale, that he promised to speak for me to the Maid, without whom I was a man lost.  Moreover, he swore that, as early as might be, he would visit the Church of St. Aignan, and there examine into the matter of this cordelier, whom some knew, and could testify against, if he was my man.

No more could I do that night, but next morning D’Aulon awoke me a little after dawn.

“It is a true tale,” he said, “and worse than I deemed, for your bird has flown!  Last night he so spoke with me in the church when I lodged him there, that I reckoned him a simple man and a pious.  But he has vanished from among his brethren, none knows how or whither.”

“The devil, his master, knows,” I said.  “Faith, he has a shrewd care of his own.  But this, I misdoubt me, is the beginning of evil to us and to the Maid.”

“A knave more or less is of little count in the world,” said he; “but now I must make your peace with the Maid, for she speaks of no less than sending you forth from her household.”

His promise he kept so well—for he was a very honourable man, as any in France—that the Maid sent for me and showed me the best countenance, even begging my pardon with all sweetness, and in so fair a manner that I could have wept.

“It was my first blow in war,” she said, smiling kindly, as was her manner, “and I hope to strike no more as with my own hand, wherefore I carry my banner to avoid the slaying of men.  But verily I deemed that you were about stabbing my prisoner, and him a priest.  Belike we shall hear no more of him, and I misdoubt that he is no true son of Holy Church.  To-day let me see you bear yourself as boldly against armed men, that I may report well of you to your lady and my friend.”

Therewith she held out her hands and took mine, as frankly as does one brother in arms with another.  And I kissed her hand, and kept my tears in my own heart.  But no deadlier blow for France and for herself was ever dealt than when the Maid struck down my sword, that was thirsting for the blood of Brother Thomas, and was within an inch of his throat.  Often have I marvelled how the saints, who, as then, guarded her, gave her no warning, as they did of the onslaught on St. Loup; but it might not be, or it was not their will, to which we must humbly submit ourselves.  And now I think I see that wolf’s face, under the hood, with anger and fear in the ominous eyes.  In the Church of St. Loup we found him, and he was a wolf of the holy places.  None the less, the words of the Maid brought more keenly to my mind the thought of Elliot, whom in these crowded hours, between my sorrow and anger, and fear of the Maid’s wrath, I had to some degree forgotten.  They were now ordering an onslaught on a post of the English beyond the river, and there came into my heart that verse of the “Book of a Hundred Ballades”: how a lover must press into breach, and mine, and escalade to win advancement and his lady’s favour; and I swore within myself that to-day I would be among the foremost.

CHAPTER XIII—OF THE FIGHTING AT LES AUGUSTINS AND THE PROPHECY OF THE MAID

Just above the broken bridge of Orleans there is a broad island, lying very near the opposite shore, with a narrow, swift passage of water between bank and island.  Some two furlongs higher up the river, and on the further bank, the English had built a small fort, named St. Jean le Blanc, to guard the road, and thither they sent men from Les Augustins.  The plan of our captains was to cross by boats on to the island, and thence by a bridge of planks laid on boats to win over the narrow channel, and so make an onslaught on St. Jean le Blanc.  For this onslaught the Maid had now been armed by her women, and with all her company, and many knights, was making ready to cross.  But before she, or we with her, could attain the shore, horses being ill beasts in a boat ferry, the light-armed townsfolk had crossed over against St. Jean le Blanc to spy on it, and had found the keep empty, for the English had drawn back their men to the Bastille of Les Augustins.

Thus there was no more to do, for the captains deemed not that we were of any avail to attack Les Augustins.  They were retreating then to the bridge of boats, and Messires de Gaucourt, De Villars, and other good knights were guarding the retreat, all orderly, lest the English might sally out from Les Augustins, and, taking us in the rear, might slay many in the confusion of crossing the boat-bridge, when the Maid and La Hire, by great dint of toil, passed their horses in a ferry-boat on to the further bank.  At this moment the English sallied forth, with loud cries, from Les Augustins, and were falling on our men, who, fearing to be cut off, began to flee disorderly, while the English called out ill words, as “cowards” and “ribaulds,” and were blaspheming God that He should damn all Frenchmen.

Hereon the Maid, with her banner, and La Hire, with lance in rest, they two alone, spurred into the press, and now her banner was tossing like the flag of a ship in the breakers, and methought there was great jeopardy lest they should be taken.  But the other French and Scots, perceiving the banner in such a peril, turned again from their flight, and men who once turn back to blows again are ill to deal with.  Striking, then, and crying, Montjoie! St. Denis! and St. Andrew for Scotland! they made the English give ground, till they were within the palisade of Les Augustins, where they deemed them safe enough.  Now I had struggled through the throng on the island, some flying, some advancing, as each man’s heart bade him, till I leaped into the water up to my waist and won the land.  There I was running to the front of the fight when D’Aulon would have stopped me, for he had a command to hold a certain narrow way, lest the English should drive us to the water again.

All this was rightly done, but I, hearing the cry of St. Andrew, was as one possessed, and paying no heed to D’Aulon, was for thrusting me forward, when