The Winning of the Golden Spurs Part 6

For over an hour Redward lay awake pondering over the events of the day, but just as sleep was about to gain the mastery, a hoa.r.s.e shout fell upon his ear. Another followed, and a veritable babel of shrieks betokened that something untoward was happening in the village.

CHAPTER III

OF THE MIDNIGHT DESCENT OF THE FRENCH INVADERS

THE first shout was enough to rouse the old archer into active alertness, for, with his experience of camp life, he was accustomed to awaken readily at the least noise. Hastily springing up, he rushed to the window, swung aside the wooden flap and the flimsy fabric that served to admit the light, and looked out. The darkness was intense, save for some small tongues of dark red flame that were beginning to shoot up from one of the houses near the waterside, the fire casting a dull glare upon the neighbouring buildings and serving but to intensify the inky blackness of the night.

"A fire," he said aloud, yet on second thoughts the ever-increasing shrieks, groans, shouts, and curses that were borne on the air belied his surmise. Moreover, his quick ear detected commands and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns in a foreign language--the tongues of Picardy, Normandy, and Spain.

His ready brain grasped the situation--it must be a raid by the French and Spaniards, who at that time swarmed in the English Channel.

These inroads upon our sh.o.r.es by the French during the Hundred Years'

War are apt to be ignored or lightly pa.s.sed over by modern historians, yet during a time when England was busy pouring the best of her blood and treasure into France there was hardly a town on the South Coast that escaped the ravages of the French and their allies, the Spaniards and Genoese.

"Awake! awake! Raymond!" shouted his father. "The French are upon us!"

Raymond sprang up and began to hastily don his clothes, while the archer laid hands on every heavy article in the room, barricading the door and securing the windows. Then, having made ready his bow, he again looked out towards the village.

By this time a series of unequal combats were taking place in the narrow streets or within the houses, where the terrified inhabitants were being routed out like rabbits. All who came across the path of the ruthless invaders were cut down without mercy--men, women, and children--while their homes were being plundered and afterwards fired by men to whom the sacking of a town was almost a familiar task.

To add to the din the church bell was ringing a violent tocsin, and all who were able to escape fled either to the stout Norman tower to seek shelter, or else across the open country towards the town of Southampton.

Raymond, white-faced with pardonable fear and shaking in every limb, now joined his father. Flight for them was now out of the question, for already some of the foemen had pa.s.sed the house, hard in pursuit of a party of fugitives, the slowest of whom fell under the weapons of the relentless marauders. Like bloodhounds on the trail, this band of pursuers pa.s.sed by the solitary house, ignoring its existence or else meaning to plunder it at their leisure after the chase of the fugitives was ended.

Suddenly four or five dark figures, silhouetted against the now bright glare of the burning village, came running up the hill and headed straight for the house.

"Quickly, Raymond, notch a shaft!" hissed the archer, and setting an example, he fitted an arrow to his bow and waited, with the weapon slightly bent, the opportunity to let fly.

"By St. George, they are our friends!" exclaimed Redward.

"Andrew Walter! d.i.c.k!" he shouted. "This way, for your lives, and ye are safe!" And throwing his great bulk against the barricade behind the door, he moved it sufficiently to enable the door to be opened to admit the fugitives.

Then the furniture was replaced against the door, and the men sank breathless and panic-stricken on the floor. There were six in all, so that the little garrison now amounted to eight men, whereof three had had experience in warfare.

"Get ye up!" ordered Redward roughly. "Think ye that I opened my doors to allow a set of cowardly curs to lie about my hearth? Up with ye!"

Stung by the rebuke, the men armed themselves with bow and sword, gripping their weapons with newborn resolve.

"Ah, by Our Lady, 'tis well ye look on the right side o' things. But if we are to see the light of another day we must stand firm," said the archer grimly. "And," he added, "let no man loose bow till I give the word, and may G.o.d and St. George look favourably upon us this night!"

"Ay, gossip!" replied Walter Bevis, a veteran of Falkirk. "An' if we cannot live we can at least die like Englishmen! But, who comes?"

Another dark figure came flying up the hill, hotly pursued by half a score of Frenchmen.

"'Tis Will Lightfoot, of Hook!" replied one of the defenders. "Run, Will, run!"

"Now loose!" cried Redward, and immediately five arrows flew on their deadly errand. It was the first time that Raymond had seen a shaft sped in anger, and the sight thrilled him strangely. The pursuers, standing out strongly against the glare, made easy marks; four of them fell face forwards on the ground, writhing in mortal agony; the fifth, struck in the right fore-arm, dropped his sword and yelled l.u.s.tily. The others, amazed at meeting with any attempt at organised resistance, turned and fled towards the village, two more falling as the result of a second flight of the deadly arrows.

Will Lightfoot, holding a dagger in his left hand and a broken sword in his right, came up to the improvised fortress with an easy stride, for his name well suited him amid the encouraging shouts of his friends.

"Wait while I unbar the door," called Redward to the fugitive, at the same time directing the others to a.s.sist him in removing the barricade.

"Nay, keep the door fast; the villains will be here anon," replied Lightfoot. "I'll find a way in."

And suiting the action to the word, he sprang on a low fence, and from thence vaulted easily on to the thatched roof. Getting a grip with his broken sword and dagger, he ran up the sloping roof of thatch like a cat, and dropped through the aperture that did duty for a chimney, and alighted in the midst of the smouldering logs on the hearth.

"Pardon, friends, for my mode of entry," he exclaimed. "But methinks the mischief I have done to thy roof, Master Buckland, will ill compare with the damage that our attackers will do ere a few hours are spent."

In the lull that followed the besieged took steps to strengthen their defences. Redward brought out a large oaken chest filled with arrows, whereat his son wondered all the more at the reason for the journey to Botley on the previous day. Thick boards were spiked to the windows, dividing each opening into two oylets, or slots for discharging arrows, while on the side where no windows existed a few of the stones were removed so as to form an additional outlook commanding the hitherto invisible ground on the north.

Food they had sufficient for three or four days, but water was scarce. This necessary they must procure, so once again the door was opened, and Raymond crept out stealthily with two leathern jacks to procure some of the precious fluid from the well, while the others crowded to the loopholes to cover his retreat if molested.

With an indescribable feeling of fear, mingled with the dread of being thought a coward by the defenders, Raymond did his work silently and quickly. Thrice did he go to the well, till there was sufficient water stored in the house to last for a considerable time.

All the while the shouts, groans, and cries continued, the crackling and roaring of the flames making a fitting accompaniment, and giving evidence that resistance was still being kept up in another quarter.

At length the pale dawn began to show a welcome change to the anxious men, on whom the weary waiting told far more than the actual struggle.

Gradually the daylight increased, and by its aid the besieged were able to realise more fully their hazardous position. Nearly every house was in flames, some even now reduced to a heap of glowing ashes. Here and there the corpse of a Spaniard or a Frenchman showed that, in spite of the surprise, the attack had been fiercely opposed.

Those villagers who had taken refuge in the church tower still resisted, though, from the desultory arrows that came from the top of the structure, it was evident that their store of missiles was well-nigh exhausted.

The invaders, too, were aware of this, for those wearing armour advanced also to the base of the tower, avoiding, however, the pieces of stone that the desperate men detached from the pinnacles and hurled down on their adversaries. Others, keeping further off, shot their bolts at the tower, stamping and jumping as if to terrify their quarry. Some of the foreign crossbowmen were so close to the house that sheltered Buckland's party that they could hear the clicking of their moulinets and the deep ba.s.s hum of the strings as the quarrels sped towards the mark.

Out in mid-stream, their hulls swinging to the tide, lay three long, low-lying galleys, and between them and the sh.o.r.e a number of small boats were rowing to and fro, those putting off being full of plunder; and as fast as each little craft discharged its load into the capacious hold of its parent galley it returned to the sh.o.r.e to remove some of the huge heap of booty, which was still being replenished by parties of foragers.

Loud and long were the maledictions of the men in Redward's house, as they saw their homes given to the flames and their kinsfolk and friends either cruelly murdered or else houseless fugitives; but soon their attention was riveted on the final scene in the resistance of those on the church tower.

The crossbowmen redoubled their fire, and, covered by the heavy rain of missiles, a party of men-at-arms advanced with their s.h.i.+elds held over their heads. A shower of blows with their heavy battle-axes soon splintered the oaken door, and when at length only a few fragments of wood and the bent and battered remains of the ma.s.sive hinges remained, the men retreated in the same order, though two were left lying crushed beneath a ponderous piece of coping that the a.s.sailed had toppled over.

Already the church was sacked. Crucifixes, candlesticks, altar-cloths, rich vestments, and tapestries had been ruthlessly taken off to the galleys; while the priest, with a score of persons, men, women and children, who had vainly sought sanctuary, lay dead within the altar rails.

And now a body of lightly-armed men--Spaniards, judging by their swarthy complexions--advanced, bearing bundles of straw and f.a.ggots, almost unmolested, for the arrows of the besieged had long given out, and the hail of bolts from the crossbows skimmed across the top of the parapet like hail. The men reached the base of the tower, where they heaped their burdens within the doorway.

A lighted torch was applied to the fuel, and a tongue of flame, darting from amid the thick cloud of suffocating smoke, licked the grim stone walls, while the spiral staircase, acting like a lofty chimney, fanned the fire till it glowed like a potter's furnace.

A ring of armed men surrounded the tower. The crossbowmen, their work done, ceased their firing, discharging only an occasional bolt as the tormented wretches on the tower, unable to bear the choking heat, showed themselves above the protection of the parapet. Some of the defenders, maddened by their agony, threw themselves headlong; others, sword in hand, attempted to descend the stairs, and hurl themselves upon their enemies, though they perished in the flames long before they reached the ground; others, defying and cursing the invaders, shook their weapons in impotent rage, till a well-directed quarrel or the rapidly-increasing flames claimed the last of the gallant band of forgotten heroes.

When resistance in this quarter was at an end, the invaders were free to direct their energies against the solitary stone house that had already wrought great mischief upon them; and, led by two knights in complete armour, the men-at-arms began to fall in in close order at a distance of two hundred paces from where Redward Buckland and his devoted companions awaited the onslaught.

"With yonder ruin to serve as an example," said the master-bowman, pointing to the flaming tower, "we must fight to the death. While there is yet time it would be well that each man doth confess his sins for the betterment of his soul."

So saying, all the defenders knelt down reverently, though Redward, trained soldier that he was, kept an eye on their gathering foes. The prayers _in extremis_ were hurriedly said; then, in the absence of a friar, they confessed to each other, according to the Roman custom when in peril of death. One of the villagers produced a slip of the Holy Thorn, brought from the miraculous tree of Glas...o...b..ry, and this they all kissed devoutly in the hope of obtaining spiritual consolation.

This done, they arose from their knees, embraced each other, and hurried to their posts.