第88章 HOW,AND BY WHOSE DEVICE,THE MAID WAS TAKEN ATCOMPI

Beyond the boulevard,forth to the open country,lay a wide plain,and behind it,closing it in,a long,low wall of steep hills.On the left,a mile and a half away,Father Francois showed me the church tower of Venette,where the English camped;to the right,a league off,was the tower of Clairoix;and at the end of a long raised causeway that ran from the bridge across the plain,because of the winter floods,I saw the tower and the village of Margny.

All these towns and spires looked peaceful,but all were held by the Burgundians.Men-at-arms were thick on the crest of our boulevard,and on the gate-keep,all looking across the river towards the town,whence the Maid should sally by way of the bridge.So there I lay on a couch in the window and waited,having no fear,but great joy.

Nay,never have I felt my spirit lighter within me,so that Ilaughed and chattered like a fey man.The fresh air,after my long lying in a chamber,stirred me like wine.The May sun shone warm,yet cooled with a sweet wind of the west.The room was full of women and maids,all waiting to throw flowers before the Maid,whom they dearly loved.Everything had a look of holiday,and all was to end in joy and great victory.So I laughed with the girls,and listened to a strange tale,how the Maid had but of late brought back to life a dead child at Lagny,so that he got his rights of Baptism,and anon died again.

So we fleeted the time,till about the fifth hour after noon,when we heard the clatter of horses on the bridge;and some women waxed pale.My own heart leaped up.The noise drew nearer,and presently She rode across and forth,carrying her banner in the noblest manner,mounted on a grey horse,and clad in a rich hucque of cramoisie;she smiled and bowed like a queen to the people,who cried,"Noel!Noel!"Beside her rode Pothon le Bourgignon (not Pothon de Xaintrailles,as some have falsely said),her confessor Pasquerel on a palfrey;her brother,Pierre du Lys,with his new arms bravely blazoned;and her maitre d'hotel,D'Aulon.But of the captains in Compiegne no one rode with her.She had but her own company,and a great rude throng of footmen of the town that would not be said nay.They carried clubs,and they looked,as I heard,for no less than to take prisoner the Duke of Burgundy himself.

Certain of these men also bore spades and picks and other tools;for the Maid,as I deem,intended no more than to take and hold Margny,that so she might cut the Burgundians in twain,and sunder from them the English at Venette.Now as the night was not far off,then at nightfall would the English be in sore straits,as not knowing the country and the country roads,and not having the power to join them of Burgundy at Clairoix.This,one told me afterwards,was the device of the Maid.

Be this as it may,and a captain of hers,Barthelemy Barrette,told me the tale,the Maid rode gallantly forth,flowers raining on her,while my heart longed to be riding at her rein.She waved her hand to Guillaume de Flavy,who sat on his horse by the gate of the boulevard,and so,having arrayed her men,she cried,"Tirez avant!"and made towards Margny,the foot-soldiers following with what speed they might,while I and Father Francois,and others in the chamber,strained our eyes after them.All the windows and roofs of the houses and water-mills on the bridge were crowded with men and women,gazing,and it came into my mind that Flavy had done ill to leave these mills and houses standing.They wrought otherwise at Orleans.This was but a passing thought,for my heart was in my eyes,straining towards Margny.Thence now arose a great din,and clamour of trumpets and cries of men-at-arms,and we could see tumult,blown dust,and stir of men,and so it went for it may be half of an hour.Then that dusty cloud of men and horses drove,forward ever,out of our sight.

The sun was now red and sinking above the low wall of the western hills,and the air was thicker than it had been,and confused with a yellow light.Despite the great multitude of men and women on the city walls,there came scarcely a sound of a voice to us across the wide river,so still they kept,and the archers in the boats beneath us were silent:nay,though the chamber wherein I lay was thronged with the people of the house pressing to see through the open casement,yet there was silence here,save when the father prayed.

A stronger wind rising out of the west now blew towards us with a sweet burden of scent from flowers and grass,fragrant upon our faces.So we waited,our hearts beating with hope and fear.

Then I,whose eyes were keen,saw,blown usward from Margny,a cloud of flying dust,that in Scotland we call stour.The dust rolled white along the causeway towards Compiegne,and then,alas!forth from it broke little knots of our men,foot-soldiers,all running for their lives.Behind them came more of our men,and more,all running,and then mounted men-at-arms,spurring hard,and still more and more of these;and ever the footmen ran,till many riders and some runners had crossed the drawbridge,and were within the boulevard of the bridge.There they stayed,sobbing and panting,and a few were bleeding.But though the foremost runaways thus won their lives,we saw others roll over and fall as they ran,tumbling down the sides of the causeway,and why they fell I knew not.

But now,in the midst of the causeway,between us and Margny,our flying horsemen rallied under the Maiden's banner,and for the last time of all,I heard that clear girl's voice crying,"Tirez en avant!en avant!"Anon her horsemen charged back furiously,and drove the Picards and Burgundians,who pursued,over a third part of the raised roadway.