God Wills It! Part 37

"You are all suspicions and jealousy," declared Mary, pouting. "Did I let you, I believe you would clap Hossein in fetters."

"I would I saw them on his wrists!" muttered the veteran, as he went away to his supper. But Richard and Mary sat a long time before their tent, sipping the spiced wine of Lesbos they had brought from Constantinople, and watching the stars peep out one by one from the deepening sky. The camp buzzed all about, yet dimly, as if each man was in love with quiet. It was very warm, and the soft wind bore the scent of drying wild-flowers and parching heather, as it crept down from the sun-loved uplands. It was a sweet and peaceful hour, one which stayed as a pure and holy vision in both their minds for many a long, sad day.

"Sweetheart," said Richard, when they grew tired of counting the budding stars, "though Prince Tancred and the rest will not hear it, there will be a mighty battle to-morrow. I have seen Kilidge Arslan's hosts all around us. We shall fight in the morning as never at Nicaea."

"Ah! Richard," answered Mary, still in laughing mood, "you must let me ride with you. See!"--and she caught the dagger from his belt--"can I not strike as manfully as any dapper little squire, and make the infidels flee before me, as ever did your Frank hero, great Roland?"

"Verily," cried her husband, his eyes on her face, "I think if the Moslems saw you coming, they would drop every man his sword,--your darts would pierce them."

"My darts?" asked she.

"Yes, truly,--these," and he laid his fingers on her eyes.

"No," was the answer, and she shook him off. "Listen: my eyes are my sorrow,--first, because they captured the Baron de St. Julien, who deserves no such bondage;" then, more gravely, "next, because they nigh undid Louis de Valmont; and last--O Richard! still I have mighty fear of Iftikhar Eddauleh; he is seeking your life, and G.o.d knows whether his unholy pa.s.sion for me is still in his heart! Swear, swear to me, Richard, that rather with your own hands you will take my life than suffer me to fall into _that_ man's power. He is Moslem, but on that account I do not hate him; yet death were better than to be his bride!"

Richard was accustomed to these changing flashes of gay and grave; but he knew there was no common ring of entreaty in Mary's last words, and he answered very soberly:--

"Heart of my heart, I am here in all my strength, with Trenchefer at my side, and around are thousands of good Christian knights. When they are all slain, and I also, then you may fear Iftikhar Eddauleh. Till then, think of likelier things to dread."

Mary was silent, watching the stars for a moment, then replied:--

"You say well, Richard, you are very strong. I am proud of you. Yet I have a strange fear that all your strength cannot s.h.i.+eld me from Iftikhar. But no more of my folly,--perchance I am moonstruck. Let me go to the tent, to say one prayer to the Holy Mother to keep you safe to-morrow, and then to sleep, to dream how happy we shall be when we go back to France."

So he kissed her; and when the flaps of the tent had closed behind her and her maids, he called Hossein.

"Good fellow, to-morrow we expect battle. To-day you have been a gallant guard of the princess. Remain by her to-morrow; defend her with your life. As I live, if you do your duty, reward shall not fail."

"Cid," answered the Arab, kissing the Baron's feet, "I hear and obey.

I swear, on my head, no unfriendly hand shall touch your very n.o.ble wife."

As Richard looked about, he saw Theroulde standing in the firelight.

"And you, too, Sir Minstrel," said he, "shall stand guard with Hossein over your lady." As he spoke, he thought he heard a low curse, "Eblees confound him!" burst from under Hossein's breath. "Ha! What said you, Arab?" asked Longsword.

"I was but sighing as I thought of my many sins, Cid," answered the fellow, very dutifully.

Richard did not reply, but repeated to himself ere he fell asleep: "It is as well Theroulde will be with Mary. Despite everything, I mislike this Hossein, for some reason."

Richard slept heavily, and was awakened by a hand on the shoulder. It was the St. Julien knight, De Carnac, who commanded the watch of his baron's command.

"Up, fair lord!" the warrior was urging, "the Seljouks are closing round. Our sentinels are being driven in. I am bidden summon you to council with the Prince of Tarentum." And with this Richard staggered to his feet and stared around. It was very dark in the tent as he put on hauberk and helmet. Without there was hum of many voices, distant shouting, baggage cattle chafing and clinking their chains, and presently a clear French war-cry, doubly piercing in the night, "_Montjoye Saint Denis!_" A moment later a trumpet blared out, then another and another.

Richard stepped from the tent; the sky was graying in the east; encampment--men, horses, all--were vague black shadows just visible.

He was buckling fast Trenchefer when the flaps of the next tent parted, and forth came a figure--his wife. In the dim twilight he could only see the whiteness of her bare throat and the soft, unbound hair, waving on forehead and shoulders. She came to him, and embraced him without a word. Then at last she said, "Now, dear life, you must ride out and fight G.o.d's battle, and if I cannot gallop at your side, you shall know that my heart and my prayers ride with you; and you must be very brave and very strong, and I will wait here and be brave also."

"Ah! beautiful," answered he, before he swung into the saddle of the waiting Rollo, "G.o.d will have pity on me for your dear sake. You know no words can tell you all I feel."

"Our Lord be with you!" and with that word upon her lips she kissed him; and he mounted, took lance, and rode away, with all the St.

Julien men saving a few grooms, also Theroulde and Hossein, who were to remain by the tents.

With the breath of the last kiss on his lips, and his head held very high, Richard Longsword led his troop out of the gray maze of the encampment. Battle was before him--a great battle against countless infidels, such as he and his peers had often made merry to think of; yet Longsword felt no joy that morning. Fear for himself he had none; the battle might sweep over him, the war-horns blow his funeral ma.s.s--what matter? Yet in a way his heart was sad. It would have been better had Mary remained at La Haye; better were he to fight for himself and the cause of Christ alone. But he knew not why he should grieve. That the Seljouks should so prevail over the soldiers of the Cross as to menace the encampment, scarce entered his head. Only he had been happier, could he have recalled his command to Hossein, taken the Arab in his troops, left another to guard the lady. But the fellow had twice proved his devotion. Why mistrust? And all such thoughts sped from his mind when he saw, dimly ahead, armed cavaliers sitting on their tall _destrers_, and Prince Bohemond's voice called:--

"Who rides? De St. Julien?"

"The same, my lord prince; what news?"

"Praise St. Michael, you are here! We need all our wits. The infidels are closing round, and dark as it is we can hear the hoof-beats of tens of thousands. We must prepare for battle with the dawn."

"And have you taken my advice, my Lord Tancred," asked Richard, "and sent messengers to the Duke?"

"Two knights and ten men-at-arms have ridden an hour since," replied Tancred, for he was among the hors.e.m.e.n. "Yet I would vow Our Lady two gold candlesticks, were I sure they could get through the hordes. You may mock me, De St. Julien, if you will, for not heeding your warning last evening."

"Mockery is of little profit this morning, my lord," said Richard, soberly; "how may I serve you?"

But at this moment came another cavalier, in armor that gleamed in the wan light, and behind him a great train.

"Hail, fair Duke Robert!" cried Bohemond; "what news do your outposts bring you?"

The son of William the Conqueror swore a deep Norman oath, and replied: "In my quarter arrows pelt like hailstones; all the fiends are broke loose. They only wait the light to strike us. G.o.d grant we are all well shriven, for we may sleep with the saints ere another morning!"

"Fair lords," said Tancred, "we must go to our posts and array the battle. De St. Julien, bid the varlets and footmen place the baggage wagons round the camp, to make what barricade they may. After that, put your men at my right, for by the Virgin, we shall see stout fighting!"

So the council broke up, there being nothing to advise save to fight heartily. Richard sent the heralds through the camp and, with cry and trumpet, roused the sleeping host, though the alarms of the night already had waked many. A great confusion there was: a thousand voices shouting at once, women wailing, war-horns blaring, wheels creaking, all trebly loud in the murk of the breaking day. Long before the wagon barrier, also, was as it should be, a great cry began to swell: "The foe! the foe!" and the infantry commenced to bang their s.h.i.+elds and clatter their pike-staffs, for discipline was none the best. Richard rode away with his hundred St. Julien troopers,--men that he could trust to the last pinch,--and drew them up beside the personal command of Prince Tancred. Prince Bohemond and the Norman Duke had arrayed their mailed cavalry in a solid rank, the line stretching far down the plain, every man in complete armor, with a good horse between his knees. As the light strengthened, Richard could see the long files of lances, ten thousand bright pennons whipping the wind, and the new sun shone on as many burnished casques and flas.h.i.+ng targets--n.o.ble sight; yet not so strange as that which he beheld when he looked northward just east of the little town called Dorylaeum. The hills, so far as eye could reach, were covered with an innumerable host, thousands on thousands, and all on horseback. He could see the gay red and green turbans, the bright scarfs and mantles, pennons, banners--past counting; and even as the sun lifted above the hills, and sent its weird red light over the valley, a mighty roar of tambour, kettledrum, and cymbal came rolling from the foe, and a shout from myriad throats, wild, beastlike, shrill as the winter wind. With the shout, as if at magician's wand, all the hills seemed moving; and the Seljouk hordes charged straight upon the Christian lines.

It was a wondrous spectacle; far as the eye might pierce, only hors.e.m.e.n, and more hors.e.m.e.n, speeding at headlong gallop. "Christ pity us!" more than one bronze-faced cavalier muttered in his beard. And some cried, "Charge!" But Tancred held them steady. The hordes swept on as one man, nearer, so near that the dust-cloud blew in the Christians' faces; and all braced themselves for the shock. But just as the crash was about to tremble on the air, lo! the foremost Turks had wheeled like lightning, and arrows flew out that darkened the sky by their number. And as the first horde rolled off to one flank, still shooting, the next, the next, and yet another whirled past, pouring forth their volleys.

"Stand fast, Christians!" was Tancred's shout, as the first shafts dashed harmlessly on the good mail; and for a moment the Franks sat, their steeds immovable, and let the blast of steel beat on them. Yet only for a moment; though but one arrow in a hundred struck home, here and there men were bleeding, wounded horses plunging. Each instant Crusaders were falling; should they sit forever and be shot to death?

Duke Robert was the first to charge. "_Dex aie!_" cried his Norman knights, and lance in rest they spurred straight in the face of the wheeling myriads. Vain courage! A few Seljouks they struck and rode over in a twinkling; but the vast horde parted before them like water, and rained in arrows and ever more arrows from safe distance. The Duke regained his lines, but one-fourth of his men had been stricken, and the terrible horse-archers were shooting a more deadly shower than ever.

"The foot! the crossbowmen!" was the cry of the raging knights. And their archers and arbalisters, coming to the front, tried to return the fire as best they could. Many a Seljouk rode no more after their volley, but their shafts were as a bucket on a holocaust. Hors.e.m.e.n, and yet more hors.e.m.e.n, were rolling in. More and more rapid the arrow fire, the sky was dark with flying dust, the ear deafened with the thunders of hoofs uncounted, the clash of the kettledrums, the yell and howl of the Seljouks. Flesh and blood could stand the strain no more. Either the Turks must be routed, or the Franks would perish to a man.

"Charge! Charge!" this time the cry went down the line on every lip.

Two arrows had grazed Rollo, despite his leathern armor. Thrice had Richard felt the sting on his ribs, where the mail had turned the shaft. Only one desire had he now,--to ride through or over his tormenters.

"G.o.d wills it! Normandy! Normandy!" came from Duke Robert's cavaliers.

"_Montjoye Saint Denis!_" rang from the Count of Chartres. "_Biez!_"

thundered the Auvergners; and the whole steel-mailed line swept upon the Seljouks, like an avalanche. And now a cras.h.!.+ They smote the Turks with might irresistible; the _destrers_ trampled down the frail Tartar horses by thousands. What guard were light targets and cotton turbans to the swords of the men of France? For a moment, when Richard reined in Rollo, he believed the foe annihilated.

"G.o.d wills it!" myriad voices were calling. Yet even as the dust hung in the air, the arrows began to beat down again. Like flies the Turks had scattered; like flies they returned, new hordes making good all loss. And now the Christians were in deadly peril, for their ranks were all broken into little handfuls, and the Seljouks swarmed round each, trying to trample it down by weight of numbers. Richard led his men back from the charge. Trenchefer was very red. How many Turks opposed the St. Julieners he could not tell, but by the grace of the saints the line was re-formed at last. Prince Bohemond, crafty of heart, but a very lion in battle, flew down the line to steady it.

"We have slain a thousand infidels!" the Count of Chartres was crying.

"One more charge and we have victory!"

"One more such victory and we are crowned martyrs!" Prince Tancred made answer. "Robert of Paris is slain, and William, my brother, and a hundred good knights more; and we are being shot down like sparrows."

Another onrush of the Seljouks, this time nearer. Richard felt the moments creeping by with leaden feet. The possibility of a disaster beyond thought stared him in the face. It was one thing to go to death in a fair fight with the sword hot in one's hand--another to sit pa.s.sive and feel destruction beating down. Yet he was thinking, not of himself, but of another. Prince Tancred, burning to avenge his brother's loss, charged out with his own troop. The Seljouks closed around him like the sea. Bohemond flew to aid, and rescued his nephew.

Richard saw Tancred riding back within the lines bareheaded and b.l.o.o.d.y, his lance broken. "Christ keep our souls, the Seljouks have our bodies," murmured the Breton Count Rothold, "I will not die here!"