"Towards Chartres," answered the Duke, and the troop took their way across the stream.
CHAPTER XIX.
The sight of pain and suffering, to which man's heart--even if it do not become totally hard and obtuse by his own dealings with the rough things of the world--grows less sensible every day as he advances in life, is always matter of painful interest to woman. There is something in her bosom that tells her it is her own destiny to suffer. There are fine links of sympathy that bind her affections to the sufferer, and not alone the general tenderness of her nature, to which such feelings are commonly altogether ascribed. The words of a woman's compassion are always different from those of a man's; they show that she brings the pain she witnesses more home to her own heart. Man may grieve for another's anguish; she sympathises with it; man feels for the man, she actually shares his pain.
Helen de la Tremblade remained in the lower story of the house, even after the shutters had been put up and the door closed by the farmer, when the first party of fugitive Leaguers passed by. She took little note of anything that followed, but sat meditating over her own fate, with her head leaning on her hand, till the sound of a groan struck her; but then starting up at once, she advanced towards the door of the room, which led into a wide, long passage. There she found four stout soldiers bearing in a wounded man; and though she could not see his face, from his visor being down, the languid attitude in which he lay, as his men carried him in their arms, showed her clearly that he had received some terrible injuries. Self was forgotten in a moment; her own sorrows, her own wrongs, the bitter regrets of the past, the desolate despair of the future, were all swept away for the time, and, clasping her hands, she exclaimed, "Alas! alas! he is dying, I fear.--Bring him hither, bring him hither," she continued: "there is a bed in this room," and she led the way through the hall to the chamber, where she and Rose d'Albret had passed the preceding night.
Carrying him slowly forward, the soldiers laid the wounded man, still in his dinted and dusty arms, upon the couch, and instantly began to unfasten his cuirass, through, which a small hole, as if pierced by the shot of an arquebuse, might be seen, stained at the edge with blood; but he waved his hand saying, in a faint voice, "The casque, the casque! take off the casque! Where is my nephew?--Where is Louis?--He should be here."
"Ah," cried Helen de la Tremblade, "he went out to the battle not an hour ago. Perhaps he too is wounded or dead."
"Mad-headed boy!" cried the old Commander as they removed his casque, "he had no arms! Why did they let him go? Ha! Is not that Helen, the priest's niece?"
"Yes," replied Helen approaching timidly and taking his hand, "it is poor Helen de la Tremblade."
"Ay, I remember," said the old Commander; "but where is Rose? Where is Rose d'Albret? She was with my nephew Louis."
"Oh, she is without, here," cried Helen; "I will call her directly," and away she ran, through the hall, into the passage, and to the door. But she found it barred and bolted, and the Farmer bending down, with his ear to the key-hole, striving to catch the sounds without.