Clambering over the low fencing, the men-at-arms still advanced; the air was thick with the groans of the wounded and the shouts of "St. Denis!" "Tuez les miserables!" "A bas les poltrons!" To which the defenders answered not a word, but in grim silence discharged their arrows into the disorderly press before them.
By sheer weight of numbers the French men-at-arms gained the front of the house, and with reckless bravery attempted to tear away the improvised defences. Bows were cast aside, and the defenders, seizing swords and spears, made vicious thrusts through the loopholes as the shadows of the enemy were thrown across them.
At length the planks across one of the windows gave way, and a crowd of mail-clad warriors essayed to clamber through. Thereupon the defenders retreated to the opposite wall, and resuming their bows, volleyed their deadly shafts against the rash intruders, who, overwhelmed by the concentration of arrows in the narrow space, gave back in disorder.
Suddenly a figure clad from head to foot in plate armour—a form of defensive mail only just coming into use—appeared in the window. In vain the arrows rattled on the thrice-welded plate, and for a moment it seemed certain that the intaking was accomplished. But Redward, dropping his weapon, sprang forward, and before the mail-clad warrior could swing his long and heavy sword, the archer had thrown himself bodily upon the Frenchman.
Realising the danger, the man tried to return, but Redward, seizing him in his powerful grip, strove to drag him into the house. Lying across the window ledge, his bulk filling the whole aperture, the Frenchman effectually prevented any of his comrades from coming to his assistance, his mail-clad legs, kicking and sprawling without, keeping his would-be helpers at a discreet distance.
Then came a terrific struggle, Redward heaving and hauling on his enemy's bascinet, while the other tried his utmost to shake off the relentless grip. Nothing short of the breaking of the laces of the Frenchman's calque would release the man, and even then his unprotected head would be pierced by a ready arrow.
The knight's resistance grew feebler, till at length a hollow voice exclaimed, "Je me rends!"
"No quarter to base ravagers!" was the stern reply, and with a final mighty heave Redward dragged the steel-clad warrior through the window, and cast him with a sickening clang upon the stone floor. Then, drawing the knight's own misericorde, he cut the laces of his bascinet and plunged the dagger into his Adversary's throat.
[CHAPTER IV]
OF THE GALLANT STAND OF THE NINE ARCHERS
DISMAYED by the fall of their second leader, the attackers retired out of bowshot, leaving the nine defenders weary and spent, yet exultant over their success.