III
Le Carpentier draws a kindly veil over the sufferings of the unfortunate city. With pathetic exactitude, he tells us that a cow during the siege fetched as much as three hundred francs—an enormous sum these days—a sheep fifty francs, an egg forty sols and an ounce of salt eight sols; but he altogether omits to tell us what happened to the poor people, who had neither fifty francs nor yet forty sols to spend.
Maître Manuchet, on the other hand, assures us that at one time bread was entirely unobtainable and that rats and mice formed a part of the daily menu of the rich. He is more crude in his statements than Le Carpentier, and even lifts for our discreet gaze just one corner of that veil, wherewith history has chosen to conceal for ever the anguish of a suffering city. He shows us three distinct pictures, only sketched in in mere outline, but with boldness and an obvious regard for truth.
One of these pictures is of Jacqueline de Broyart, the wealthy heiress who shared with the departed hero the worship of the citizens of Cambray. Manuchet speaks of her as of an angel of charity, healing and soothing with words and hands and heart, as of a vision of paradise in the midst of a torturing hell—her courage and endurance a prop for drooping spirits; her voice a sweet, insistent sound above the cries of pain, the curses and the groans. Wide-eyed and pale, but with a cheering smile upon her lips, she flits through the deserted streets of Cambray, bringing the solace of her presence, the help that can be given, the food that can be shared, to many a suffering home.
Of the man who hath possession of her heart, she never speaks with those in authority; but when in a humble home there is talk of the hero who has gone and of his probable return, she listens in silence, and when conjectures fly around her as to his identity, she even tries to smile. But in her heart she knows that her knight—the man whom the people worship—will never come back. France will send troops and aid and protection anon; a puissant Prince will enter Cambray mayhap at the head of his troops and be acclaimed as the saviour of Cambray. She would no doubt in the fullness of time plight her troth to that man, and the people would be told that this was indeed the Duc d'Anjou et d'Alençon, who had once before stood upon the ramparts of Cambray and shouted his defiant cry: 'À moi, citizens; and let the body of each one of you here be a living rampart for the defence of your homes!'
But she would know that the man who spoke those inspiring words had gone from her for ever. Who he was, where he came from, what had brought him to Cambray under a disguise and an assumed name, she would perhaps never know. Nor did she care. He was the man she loved: the man whose passionate ardour had thrilled her to the soul, whose touch had been as magic, whose voice had been perfect music set in perfect time. He was the man she loved—her knight. Throughout that day upon the ramparts she had seen him undaunted, intrepid, unconquered—rallying those who quaked, cheering those who needed help, regardless of danger, devoted even unto death. So what cared she what was his name? Whoever he was, he was worthy of her love.