Won By the Sword : a tale of the Thirty Years' War by G. A. Henty (list of e readers txt) 📖

Hector sprang up, closely followed by the others. The resistance was feeble, for the height above the winding steps was but six feet, and insufficient for the use of either axes or longer weapons. Many of the peasants, astounded at seeing the armed men mounting from below them, and wholly ignorant of their numbers, threw down their weapons and cried for mercy. Hector contented himself with pushing past them, and running his sword through any who showed signs of resistance. One or two men armed with rough pikes made a stand; these he shot, and pressed upwards until within some twenty feet of the top, when the peasants, half maddened at finding themselves caught, rushed down in a body. “Close up!” he shouted to his followers. These pressed close up to him, but the weight was too much for them, and they were borne by the rush backwards down the stairs, when the peasants darted out through the door. Hector had received several knife cuts on the shoulder and arms, and would have suffered still more severely had not Paolo and Nicholl, who were next to him, thrust their pistols over his shoulder and shot his assailants, whose bodies, borne along by the pressure from behind, protected him from the blows of those above them.

“Are you hurt badly, master?” Paolo exclaimed as they stood breathless for a moment at the bottom of the stairs.

“No, I think not; my gorget saved my neck; I have four or five cuts on the shoulders, but they are mere flesh wounds. Now let us mount the stairs; the men must have made a stout defence indeed to have held out so long.”

The upper part of the stairs was indeed almost blocked with dead bodies. At the top of the stairs stood two men with axes, which they lowered as soon as they saw Hector.

“You have made a brave stand,” he said, “in defence of your mistress.”

“You have arrived but just in time, monsieur, for we are the last two left, and though we might have accounted for a few more, another five minutes would have finished it.”

Stepping out on the platform at the top of the tower, Hector saw a lady leaning against the battlements; she was deadly pale, but her face still bore a look of calm determination. In her hands she held a dagger; clinging to her was a girl of some fifteen years of age.

“Thank God, madam, that we have arrived in time!” Hector exclaimed.

“Just in time, monsieur; we had given up all hope, when, as if sent by God, we saw your little band appear riding towards us. Even then I hardly ventured to hope; it seemed well nigh impossible that six men should be able to clear a way through so many. Only two of my faithful retainers still held the stairs, and it was but too evident that these could not resist much longer; when one more had fallen I had resolved to plunge this dagger into my daughter's heart and then into my own. Death would have been a thousand times preferable to falling into the hands of these wretches.”

“How long have you been beleaguered, madam?”

“My men have been fighting for four hours. For upwards of three hours they did well, for the peasants, being unable to use their weapons, frequently drew back. Then they hit upon the device of fastening a hook to the end of a pole, and, catching this round the leg of one of the defenders, dragged him down, and then despatched him with their knives. One by one four of my men were killed. For the last half hour the two who remained stood back, one at each side of the doorway, so that they could not be so entrapped, and slew those who, mounting the stairs, tried to rush past them. Both were sorely spent, and the end must have come soon had you not appeared. Whom have I to thank for this unlooked for deliverance?”

“I am Colonel Campbell, Baron de la Villar,” Hector replied, “and have the honour to command his majesty's regiment of Poitou.”

“Your name is not French,” the lady said.

“No, madam, I am a Scotchman.”

“Then,” the lady said, speaking in English, “I must claim you as a countryman, for I am Irish. My husband was an officer in the army of the Duke of Lorraine; he was killed in a skirmish four years ago, and a year later I married the Baron of Blenfoix, and was again widowed at the battle of Freiburg, where my husband, who had followed the fortunes of the Duke of Lorraine, his feudal lord, fell fighting by the side of General Merci. This is my daughter Norah. But I see that you are wounded,” she went on as Hector bowed to the young lady.

“Not seriously, madam; but I feel somewhat faint from loss of blood, and will remove my helmet. As it turned out,” he went on somewhat faintly, “it was unfortunate that I did not put on my body armour; but I had not anticipated hard fighting, and preferred to ride without it. Thanks for your offer, lady, but my men will see to me, they are all of them pretty well accustomed to the bandaging of wounds.”

He was now, indeed, almost too faint to stand, and Paolo and Nicholl seated him against a battlement, and then proceeded to take off his upper garments and examine his wounds. They were all at the back of the shoulder, as his assailants, pressed closely against him, were unable to strike him in front. The lady tore some strips off her garment and assisted in bandaging the wound, being, as she said, well accustomed to such matters.

“Is all quiet on the stairs?” Hector inquired of the two men whom he had placed on guard there.

“Save for the sound of some groans all is still, colonel,” Hunter replied. “Methinks that after being withstood for four hours by six retainers they are not likely to make a fresh attempt against six well armed men.

“What are they doing, Macpherson?”

“They are gathered in front of the chateau, sir. A large number of things were dragged out before the flames reached them, and at present they seem to be quarrelling over the division of them. They have got some barrels of wine out of the cellars and are making free with them.”

“So much the better,” Hector said. “The company will be up in half an hour at latest, and will give them a lesson unless they move away before that; and now that they have taken to drinking they are not likely to do so.”

The bandaging of his wounds being now completed, Hector was assisted to his feet.

“I grieve, madam,” he said, “that I did not arrive in time to prevent the chateau being burned.”

“The loss is not mine; my husband's estates were confiscated when he crossed into Germany with the duke, and were some ten months ago granted to a Monsieur de Thours, a relative of the Prince of Conde; but he sent me a courteous letter to say that as he was serving with the Duc d'Enghien, I was welcome to continue to occupy the chateau until the war was over, receiving the rents as his chatelaine, paying the retainers, and keeping up the establishment, and sending the surplus to his agents at Nancy. This