In the Wars of the Roses: A Story for the Young by Evelyn Everett-Green (surface ebook reader txt) 📖

They were not alone. A gallant little company was following in their track, and with cries of "An Edward, an Edward, a Prince of Wales!" smote down the rival warriors with a fury which for the moment nothing could withstand. There is surely something magnetic in a war cry or in a patriotic song, for it inspires those who use it with an ardour and a strength which for the moment seem invincible.

To Paul and the prince it seemed as if the day were all but won. Wherever they turned they dealt death and destruction. The wing of the army upon which they charged was wavering and disorganized; the infantry recoiled before the fierce charge of the horsemen, and the opposing cavalry was mostly in another part of the field.

"Victory, victory!" shouted those about Paul and the prince; and to the enthusiastic and excited lads it seemed as if the day was already theirs. The name of the Prince of Wales was in all mouths. It was shouted by each soldier as he fell upon his foe, and the enemy appeared to recoil before it. Onward and ever onward pressed the eager little band, until it was entirely separated from the main body of the army; and so certain were all who took part in that isolated skirmish that the fortunes of the day were with the House of Lancaster, that the peril of their position struck none of the prince's followers till, thinned by the blows of their adversaries, and weary with the impetuosity of their own charge, they paused and drew together; whilst the foe, glad of a moment's breathing space, did not molest them.

There are pauses even on the battlefield when a few words can be exchanged, and the prince, flushed with the foretaste (as it seemed to him) of a glorious victory, turned to Paul with kindling eyes.

"War is a glorious game in all truth, Paul. I would not have been elsewhere for all the world. But you bleed--you are wounded. Tell me where. I knew not that you were hurt. You must ride back to the town and be tended there."

"Nay, it is nought; I do not even feel it. I know not who struck me, nor when. I will bind this scarf about my arm, and all will be well. And think you not, my liege, that it were well to return to the lines ourselves? I promised your royal mother and the Lady Anne that you should not adventure yourself too much today within the enemy's lines. But all such charge passed from my memory in the heat of the fight."

"Ay, and my place was here, in the midst of my good soldiers. Oh, it has been a glorious day! 'Lancaster will remember it ever. And see, Paul--see how they fly on yonder height! See how the battle rages and becomes a flight! It is the same everywhere. The Red Rose triumphs. Proud York is forced to fly. Shall we join them, and lead again to victory? They are chasing them to the very walls of the town."

Paul looked in the direction indicated, and a change came over his face. He had the wonderful long, keen sight which often comes to those who have grown up in the open air, and have been used from childhood to the exercise of hunting and hawking. The prince saw only the flying rout, which he concluded to be the soldiers of York; but Paul could distinguish more. He could see the colours, and the badges they wore, and he recognized with a sinking heart the terrible fact that it was the followers of the Red Rose who were flying before the mailed warriors of Edward of York.

The change in his countenance did not escape young Edward's keen eye, and he at once divined the cause, The bright flush faded from his own face, and his gaze was turned in the same direction again.

Alas! it was but too plain now; for the rout was plainly in the direction of the town, and it was easy to understand that had it been the Yorkists who had fled they would have taken an opposite direction, in order to reach their own lines.

For a moment prince and subject sat spellbound, watching that terrible sight in deep silence. But then the peril of their own position, and the deadly danger that menaced the prince if the situation should be realized by their foes surrounding them here, flashed across Paul like a vivid and terrible lightning gleam.

He turned and laid his hand upon the shoulder of the prince.

"My liege," he said, "we may not linger here. We must regain our comrades, and see if we may rally them yet. All may not be lost, but it were madness to remain here. Let me call our followers together, and we will charge back through the foe to our own lines. It is not safe to be here."

Edward made no reply. The face that had been flushed with victory and bright with hope was now set in those stern lines which seem to speak of a forlorn hope. He saw their peril as clearly as Paul; but if the day were lost, what mattered it if his life were yet whole in him? The face he silently turned upon his companion seemed to have grown years older whilst he had been speaking.

And to make matters worse, the knowledge of the disaster to their own side spread to the soldiers who had followed the prince, and that instant demoralization which so often accompanies and aggravates defeat seized upon the men. They flung away their heavier arms, and with a shout of "Treason, treason!"--for they were assured there had been foul play somewhere--fled each man by himself, without a thought for aught save his own life.

Paul and the prince thus found themselves alone in the midst of a hostile host--alone save for the presence of some half-dozen stout troopers attached to the service of Paul, who since his advance in worldly prosperity had been in a position to engage and retain the services of some men-at-arms of his own. These faithful fellows, who had learned to love their young master, sat doggedly in their saddles, prepared to sell their lives dear, and to carry off if possible their master and the prince living from the field. But they, too, realized how desperate was the situation; and the threatening and triumphant glances of their enemies, who now began to close up round them, showed that others had realized that the battle was already won by the Yorkist faction.

"King Edward, King Edward!" shouted the fierce soldiers as they grasped their weapons anew. "Down with the Red Rose! Down with all false princes! Down with the traitors who would disturb the peace of the land! King Edward, King Edward!"

The prince looked at Paul, and Paul looked at the prince. The same thought was in the minds of both.

"We will at least sell our lives dear," said young Edward in low tones. "My trusty comrade, your loyalty to the Red Rose has been but a sorry thing for you. I would I could have rewarded you with such honours as a prince has to give; but--"

"It is honour enough for me, my liege, to die at your side--to die, if it may be, in saving your life," said Paul. "Talk not so, I beseech you. The happiness of my life has been in calling myself your servant. It will be a happy death that is died at your side."

"Not servant--comrade, friend, brother," said Ed ward, holding out his hand once again, with a look that Paul never forgot. "No more, Paul. I must play the man; and such words go deep, and bring the tears to mine eyes. Paul, there are strange chances in battle, and it may be that you will live through it, and that I may be slain: If such be so, tell my mother and my wife (for she is that to me, as I am her husband in love) that I died as a prince of the House of Plantagenet should do--sword in hand and face to the foe. Tell my mother that such a death is better than an inglorious life of exile, and bid her not weep for me. There is yet another world than this in which we shall meet, where the strife of war is not heard and the malice of foes pursues us not. Let her look forward to our meeting there. It were a better prospect, in all truth, than an earthly crown, which methinks sits heavy on the head of him that wears it."

Paul said nothing, for he could not trust himself to speak, and indeed the brief respite was at an end. With loud and threatening cries the foe was closing round the devoted little band, and from the other side of the field he could see that a knot of horsemen were galloping in their direction, as though they had got some news of the presence of the prince.

Wounded as he was, and spent from having borne the brunt of that first gallant charge, Paul yet set his teeth and nerved himself for a last desperate rally. If they could cut their way through the ranks of the foes and gain the town, they might be safe at least for the moment; and that was the object of himself and his servants. Placing the reluctant prince in the midst, so as if possible to save at least him from steel or lead, the gallant little band with axes and pikes commenced hewing its way through the living wall which surrounded it. And so gallantly did the good steeds respond to the urging of their riders, and so fierce were the blows that rained down upon the heads of the footmen who barred their passage, that for a moment it seemed as if they would yet win their way back, and gain the protection of such of their comrades as had not shared in the general rout.

But alas! though the footmen gave way before them, the mounted soldiers, who were speeding across the field, saw at once the line they were taking, and galloped headlong to intercept them. Paul, in the fury of his hot young blood, dashed forward alone, and fell upon the foremost with so fierce a blow that his axe was wedged in the head-piece of his opponent, so that he was unable to draw it out. The man reeled in his saddle and fell, almost dragging Paul, who still had hold of the axe, with him; and before he could recover himself or draw his sword, he was set upon by half a score mounted riders.

For one moment he was aware of merciless blows raining down upon him, battering him to the earth; he felt suffocated, crushed, more utterly helpless and powerless than he had ever done in his life before. Quick thrills of pain were running through him, stars danced before his eyes; and through all this confusion and distress he was yet aware of some terrible danger menacing the prince--danger from which he had sworn to save him at the risk of his own life. He struggled fiercely and blindly with the foes who seemed to be above and about him, knocking the wind from his body, and holding his throat in an iron clasp. Consciousness was fast deserting him. The dancing stars had disappeared, leaving the blackest darkness behind them. He made one frantic effort to break the chain which seemed to be grinding his very life out of him, and then followed a space of blankness that must surely have been like death itself.

It might have been minutes, hours, days, or even years before Paul opened his eyes to the light of day once more, for all consciousness he had of the flight of time; but when he did so it was to meet the solicitous glance of a pair of friendly eyes, and to feel himself supported by strong arms, whilst some potent spirit was held to his lips, which, when he had drunk of it, seemed to drive away the mists and give him back his senses again.

He looked round him, and found himself lying upon a bloody field, dead and wounded strewn about him. He was upheld by the arm of one of his own stout servants; and no one else save a few wounded men or dead corpses was near. In a flash it all came back--the fight, the supposed victory, the disastrous defeat; and he groaned aloud, and struggled to regain his feet.

"The prince!" he cried, in tones sharpened by physical and mental anguish, "the prince!--where is he?"

"He is a prisoner; but he is unhurt. A gallant knight took him. His name, I learned from one of his men-at-arms,