“Who goes there?” cried a sentry on the gate-tower of Rennes late that night.
“Ar fol goët” (the fool of the forest), said a voice from below.
A murmur of joyful surprise, only restrained by prudence from swelling into a shout, greeted this strange password; but to the captain of the gate it came like a reproach, for he was no other than Du Guesclin’s cousin, Huon de St. Yvon, and this name (now a signal-word at which every Breton heart leaped) had been given to Bertrand long ago by himself and his dead brothers, in mockery of the boy’s habit of roaming the woods alone.
“Art thou there, Bertrand?” said he, peering over the wall into the gloom.
“Nay, noble Sir Huon,” replied the jester’s familiar voice, “but Messire Bertrand is not far away, and hath sent thee a token, if thou wilt lower a cord to draw it up.”
The token proved to be Bertrand’s own signet-ring, stamped with his crest of the two-headed eagle, and it secured instant admittance for both men. Roland was at once summoned to a conference with De Penhoën, the commandant, from which the rough old Breton came forth with such a grin of mischievous glee as was never seen on his iron face before.
Meanwhile the Wolf was led by St. Yvon into the presence of a richly clad lady, whose face was so marvellously beautiful, and yet so sweet and saintly, that the fierce man started at the sight of it, and cried—
“So would our Blessed Lady look were she to come on earth once more. No marvel thy lord overcame me in fight, when he had one like thee to pray for him!”
Sunrise showed to the wondering garrison a vast herd of wild swine, grunting, squeaking, and jostling, on the wide plain before the town. These had been driven in from the neighbouring woods by order of Lancaster, who, little dreaming that Roland had overheard and betrayed his plan, counted on the starving defenders making a sally to seize this tempting prey, and thus laying themselves open to a counter-attack that might win the town itself.
But crafty old Penhoën had set a soldier just within the postern-gate abutting on the river, that at this point washed the town wall, and as he began to pull the tail of a pig that he had with him, the injured animal expostulated in a series of squeals that might have been heard a mile away. No sooner did the swine outside hear their comrade’s cries, than they all went galloping toward the town!