"My purpose is some deal subtler," I said, with a laugh, "but let me keep my own counsel."
"So be it," said he, "a wilful man must have his way. And now I drink to your better wisdom, and may you escape that rope on which your heart seems to be set!"
I grasped his hand on it, and by point of day we were riding out seawards. We made an onslaught on a village, burned a house or twain, and seized certain wains of hay, so, in the confusion, I slipped forward, and rode alone into a little wood. There I clad myself in English guise, having carried the gear in a wallet on my saddle-bow, and so pushed on, till at nightfall I came to a certain little fishing-village. There, under cover of the dark, I covenanted with a fisherman to set me across the Channel, I feigning to be a deserter who was fleeing from the English army, for fear of the Maid.
"I would well that I had to carry all the sort of you," said the boat-master, for I had offered him my horse, and a great reward in money, part down, and the other part to be paid when I set foot in England. Nor did he make any tarrying, but, taking his nets on board, as if he would be about his lawful business, set sail, with his two sons for a crew. The east wind served us to a miracle, and, after as fair a pa.s.sage as might be, they landed me under cloud of night not far from the great port of Winchelsea.
That night I slept none, but walking fast and warily, under cover of a fog, I fetched a compa.s.s about, and ended by walking into the town of Rye by the road from the north. Here I went straight to the best inn of the place, and calling aloud for breakfast, I bade the drawer bring mine host to me instantly. For, at Louviers, we were so well served by spies, the country siding with us rather than with the English, that I knew how a company of the Earl of Warwick"s men was looked for in Winchelsea to sail when they had a fair wind for Rouen.
Mine host came to me in a servile English fashion, and asked me what I would?
"First, a horse," said I, "for mine dropped dead last night, ten miles hence on the north road, in your marshes, G.o.d d.a.m.n them, and you may see by my rusty spur and miry boot that I have walked far. Here," I cried, pulling off my boots, and flinging them down on the rushes of the floor, "bid one of your varlets clean them! Next, breakfast, and a pot of your ale; and then I shall see what manner of horses you keep, for I must needs ride to Winchelsea."
"You would join the men under the banner of Sir Thomas Grey of Falloden, I make no doubt?" he answered. "Your speech smacks of the Northern parts, and the good knight comes from no long way south of the border. His men rode through our town but few days agone."
"And me they left behind on the way," I answered, "so evil is my luck in horse-flesh. But for this blessed wind out of the east that hinders them, my honour were undone."
My tale was not too hard of belief, and before noon I was on my way to Winchelsea, a stout nag enough between my legs.
The first man-at-arms whom I met I hailed, bidding him lead me straight to Sir Thomas Grey of Falloden. "What, you would take service?" he asked, in a c.u.mberland burr that I knew well, for indeed it came ready enough on my own tongue.
"Yea, by St. Cuthbert," I answered, "for on the Marches nothing stirs; moreover, I have slain a man, and fled my own country."
With that he bade G.o.d d.a.m.n his soul if I were not a good fellow, and so led me straight to the lodgings of the knight under whose colours he served. To him I told the same tale, adding that I had heard late of his levying of his men, otherwise I had ridden to join him at his setting forth.
"You have seen war?" he asked.
"Only a Warden"s raid or twain, on the moss-trooping Scots of Liddesdale. Branxholme I have seen in a blaze, and have faced fire at the Castle of the Hermitage."
"You speak the tongue of the Northern parts," he said; "are you n.o.ble?"
"A poor cousin of the Storeys of Netherby," I answered, which was true enough; and when he questioned me about my kin, I showed him that I knew every name and scutcheon of the line, my mother having instructed me in all such lore of her family. {38}
"And wherefore come you here alone, and in such plight?"
"By reason of a sword-stroke at Stainishawbank Fair," I answered boldly.
"Faith, then, I see no cause why, as your will is so good, you should not soon have your bellyful of sword-strokes. For, when once we have burned that limb of the devil, the Puzel" (for so the English call the Maid), "we shall shortly drive these forsworn dogs, the French, back beyond the Loire."
I felt my face reddening at these ill words, so I stooped, as if to clear my spur of mire.
"Shortly shall she taste the tar-barrel," I answered, whereat he swore and laughed; then, calling a clerk, bade him write my indenture, as is the English manner. Thus, thanks to my northern English tongue, for which I was sore beaten by the other boys when I was a boy myself, behold me a man-at-arms of King Henry, and so much of my enterprise was achieved.
I make no boast of valour, and indeed I greatly feared for my neck, both now and later. For my risk was that some one of the men-at-arms in Rouen, whither we were bound, should have seen my face either at Orleans, at Paris (where I was unhelmeted), or in the taking of the Bastille at Compiegne. Yet my visor was down, both at Orleans and Compiegne, and of those few who marked me in girl"s gear in Paris none might chance to meet me at Rouen, or to remember me in changed garments. So I put a bold brow on it, for better might not be. None cursed the Puzel more loudly than I, and, without feigning, none longed so sorely as I for a fair wind to France, wherefore I was ever going about Winchelsea with my head in the air, gazing at the weather-c.o.c.ks. And, as fortune would have it, the wind went about, and we on board, and with no long delay were at Rouen town.
CHAPTER x.x.xI-HOW NORMAN LESLIE SAW THE MAID IN HER PRISON
On arriving in the town of Rouen, three things were my chief care, whereof the second helped me in the third. The first was to be lodged as near as I might to the castle, wherein the Maid lay, being chained (so fell was the cruelty of the English) to her bed. The next matter was to purvey me three horses of the fleetest. Here my fortune served me well, for the young esquires and pages would ever be riding races outside of the gates, they being in no fear of war, and the time till the Maid was burned hung heavy on their hands. I therefore, following the manner of the English Marchmen, thrust myself forward in these sports, and would change horses, giving money to boot, for any that outran my own. My money I spent with a very free hand, both in wagers and in feasting men-at-arms, so that I was taken to be a good fellow, and I willingly let many make their profit of me. In the end, I had three horses that, with a light rider in the saddle, could be caught by none in the whole garrison of Rouen.
Thirdly, I was most sedulous in all duty, and so won the favour of Sir Thomas Grey, the rather that he counted cousins with me, and reckoned that we were of some far-off kindred, wherein he spoke the truth. Thus, partly for our common blood, partly for that I was ever ready at call, and forward to do his will, and partly because none could carry a message swifter, or adventure further to spy out any bands of the French, he kept me close to him, and trusted me as his galloper. Nay, he gave me, on occasion, his signet, to open the town gates whensoever he would send me on any errand. Moreover, the man (n.o.ble by birth, but base by breeding) who had the chief charge and custody of the Maid, was the brother"s son of Sir Thomas. He had to name John Grey, and was an esquire of the body of the English King, Henry, then a boy. This miscreant it was often my fortune to meet, at his uncle"s table, and to hear his pitiless and cruel speech. Yet, making friends, as Scripture commands us, of the Mammon of unrighteousness, I set myself to win the affection of John Grey by laughing at his jests and doing him what service I might.
Once or twice I dropped to him a word of my great desire to see the famed Puzel, for the trials that had been held in open hall were now done in the dungeon, where only the bishop, the doctors of law, and the notaries might hear them. Her n.o.ble bearing, indeed, and wise answers (which were plainly put into her mouth by the Saints, for she was simple and ignorant) had gained men"s hearts.
One day, they told me, an English lord had cried-"The brave la.s.s, pity she is not English." For to the English all the rest of G.o.d"s earth is as Nazareth, out of which can come no good thing. Thus none might see the Maid, and, once and again, I let fall a word in John Grey"s ear concerning my desire to look on her in prison. I dared make no show of eagerness, though now the month of May had come, which was both her good and ill month. For in May she first went to Vaucouleurs and prophesied, in May she delivered Orleans, and in May she was taken at Compiegne. Wherefore I deemed, as men will, that in May she should escape her prison, or in May should die. Moreover, on the first day of March they had asked her, mocking her-
"Shalt thou be delivered?"
And she had answered-
"Ask me on this day three months, and I shall declare it to you."
The English, knowing this, made all haste to end her ere May ended, wherefore I had the more occasion for speed.
Now, on a certain day, being May the eighth, the heart of John Grey was merry within him. He had well drunk, and I had let him win of me, at the dice, that one of my three horses which most he coveted.
He then struck me in friendly fashion on the back, and cried-
"An unlucky day for thee, and for England. This very day, two years agone, that limb of the devil drove us by her sorceries from before Orleans. But to-morrow-" and he laughed grossly in his beard. "Storey, you are a good fellow, though a fool at the dice."
"Faith, I have met my master," I said. "But the lesson you gave me was worth bay Salkeld," for so I had named my horse, after a great English house on the Border who dwell at the Castle of Corby.
"I will do thee a good turn," he said. "You crave to see this Puzel, ere they put on her the high witch"s cap for her h.e.l.lward journey."
"I should like it not ill," I said; "it were something to tell my grandchildren, when all France is English land."
"Then you shall see her, for this is your last chance to see her whole."
"What mean you, fair sir?" I asked, while my heart gave a turn in my body, and I put out my hand to a great tankard of wine.
"To-morrow the charity of the Church hath resolved that she shall be had into the torture-chamber."
I set my lips to the tankard, and drank long, to hide my face, and for that I was nigh swooning with a pa.s.sion of fear and wrath.
"Thanks to St. George," I said, "the end is nigh!"
"The end of the tankard," quoth he, looking into it, "hath already come. You drink like a man of the Land Debatable."
Yet I was in such case that, though by custom I drink little, the great draught touched not my brain, and did but give me heart.
"You might challenge at skinking that great Danish knight who was with us under Orleans, Sir Andrew Haggard was his name, and his bearings were ... " {39}
So he was running on, for he himself had drunk more than his share, when I brought him back to my matter.
"But as touching this Puzel, how may I have my view of her, that you graciously offered me?"
"My men change guard at curfew," he said; "five come out and five go in, and I shall bid them seek you here at your lodgings. So now, farewell, and your revenge with the dice you shall have when so you will."