The Long Night

by Stanley John Weyman

"In Heaven's name stop!" cried Marcadel, and he gripped Claude's sleeve. "A diversion, ay!" he continued. "But a moment too soon or a moment too late—and where will we be?"

He spoke in vain. His words were wasted on the air. Claude, not to be restrained, had entered the staircase. Pike in hand he felt his way over the bodies that choked it; by this time he was half-way down the stairs. Marcadel hesitated, waited a moment, listened; then, partly because success begets success, and courage courage, partly because he would not have the triumph taken from him, he too risked all. He snatched from Gentilis' feeble hands a long pistol, part of the spoils of the staircase; and, staying only to assure himself that a portion of the priming still lay in the pan, he hurried after his leader.

By this time Claude was within four stairs of the guard-room. The low door that admitted to it stood open; and towards it a man, hearing the hasty tread of feet, had that moment turned a startled face. There was no room for anything but audacity, and Claude did not flinch. In two bounds, he hurled himself through the door on to the man, missed him with his pike—but was himself missed. In a flash the two were rolling together on the floor.

In their fall they brought down a third man, who, swearing horribly, made repeated stabs at Claude with a dagger. But the only light in the room came from the fire, the three were interlaced, and Claude was young and agile as an eel: he evaded the first thrust, and the second. The third went home in his shoulder, but desperate with pain he seized the hand that held the poniard, and clung to it; and before the man who had been the first to fall could regain his pike, or a third man who was present, but who was wounded, could drag himself, swearing horribly, to the spot, Marcadel fired from the stairs, and killed the wounded man. The next instant with a yell of "Geneva!" he sprang on the others under cover of the smoke that filled the room.

The combat was still but of two to two; and without the guard-room but almost within arm's length, were a dozen Savoyards, headed by Picot the engineer; any one of whom might, by entering, turn the scale. But the pistol-shot had come to the ears of the attacking party: that instant, guessing that they had allies within, they rallied and with loud cries returned to the attack. Even while Marcadel having disposed of one more, stood over the struggling pair on the floor, doubting where to strike, the burghers burst a second time into the gateway—on which the guard-room opened—struck down Picot, and, hacking and hewing, with cries of "Porte Gagnée! Porte Gagnée!" bore the Savoyards back.

For the half of a minute the low-groined archway was a whirl of arms and steel and flame. Half a dozen single combats were in progress at once; amid yells and groans, and the jar and clash of a score of weapons. But the burghers, fighting bareheaded for their wives and hearths, were not to be denied; by-and-by the Savoyards gave back, broke, and saved themselves. One fierce group cut its way out and fled into the darkness of the Corraterie. Of the others four men remained on the ground, while two turned and tried to retreat into the guard-room.

But on the threshold they met Claude, vicious and wounded, his eyes in a flame; and he struck and killed the foremost. The other fell under the blows of the pursuing burghers, and across the two bodies Claude and Marcadel met their allies, the leaders of the assault. Strange to say, the foremost and the midmost of these was a bandy-legged tailor, with a great two-handed sword, red to the hilt; to such a place can valour on such a night raise a man. On his right stood Blandano, Captain of the Guard, bareheaded and black with powder; on his left Baudichon the councillor, panting, breathless, his fat face running with sweat and blood—for he bore an ugly wound—but with unquenchable courage in his eyes. A man may be fat and yet a lion.

It was a moment in the lives of the five men who thus met which none of them ever forgot. "Was it one of you two who lowered the portcullis?" Blandano gasped, as he leaned an instant on his sword.

"He did," Marcadel answered, laying his hand on Claude's shoulder. "And I helped him."

"Then he has saved Geneva, and you have helped him!" Blandano rejoined bluntly. "Your name, young man."