“Jehanot! Jehanot!”
The old man mumbled through his bloody fingers:
“To the chapel, for God’s sake, madame; have a care, they are shooting at the windows.”
Tiphaïne held Jehanot by the shoulder.
“Ah—ah, the cowards! they have hurt you, my poor Jehanot. Come, come with me; we will go to the chapel, and I will hide you behind the hangings. Where is Guy?”
The old man was sick and faint with pain. Tiphaïne dragged him along the gallery to the lord’s solar, gave him wine, and bound up his bleeding mouth. The man Guy had jumped into the moat an hour ago, swum across, and fled into the woods. Jehanot confessed as much, moaning, and holding his broken jaw between his hands.
“Whose company is it—not Croquart’s?”
Jehanot shook his head, turning his whole body with it.
“They seem bad enough,” he said, “whoever they may be.”
Brunet was following them, growling and ruffling up his collar as the sound of the men battering at the gate echoed through every gallery and room. Tiphaïne half dragged Jehanot to the chapel, and hid him behind the hangings beside the altar. Then she ran back into the solar, took a burning brand from the fire with the iron tongs, and, returning, lit the candles on the altar and threw the flaming wood upon the floor. Beside the chalice, on the white altar cloth, stood the silver swan that Bertrand had given her at Rennes.