Martin felt his heart beating hard under his ribs. He looked at Swartz and the men. They were intent on the work they had in hand; they had not seen Mellis.
Chapter XXIII
Martin Valliant did some mighty rapid thinking. That glimpse of Mellis’s face had stirred his manhood to a kind of Norse frenzy. Yet he kept his wits unclouded; and this was the way he reasoned the thing out.
“They will build that bridge of theirs. I might shoot one or two of them through the loophole, but they have cross-bows and will mark the loop. When they have built their bridge they will be able to batter down the gate, and while I am busy there, one or two of them might swim the mere and come at me from behind. They are in light harness. This armor of mine should turn a cross-bow bolt. I will try to shoot one or two of them, and then open the gate, let down my bridge, and give them battle there or on the causeway.”
The audacity of the plan pleased him, for Martin Valliant was discovering in himself the wit and daring of a great fighter. He hung his green shield about his neck, dropped the vizor of his salade, took the bow and arrows and his naked sword, and made straight for the gate-house. The ladder and stage he had built gave him command of the loophole. And his luck and his cunning shook hands, for he pinked two men, one in the body and the other in the throat, before a cross-bow bolt came stinging through the loophole.
“Two from ten leaves eight.”
He scrambled down the ladder, leaving his bow on the stage, and quite calmly and at his leisure unbarred and opened the gate.
Mellis, lying in a patch of young fern on the edge of the beech wood, held her breath and watched him in amazement. For one moment a wild doubt stabbed her; he was a craven, he was going to surrender Woodmere and shirk a fight. The next moment she thought him mad, but she had torn all doubt of him from her heart and thrown it from her with hot scorn. She saw Martin let down his bridge, and take his stand just outside the gate, with the point of his sword on the ground and his hands resting on the pommel. He was a white and challenging figure holding the bridge and the gate, daring Swartz and his men to come at him and try their fortune.
One of the cross-bowmen fired a shot; the bolt struck Martin’s pauldron and glanced harmlessly aside.
“Drop that—drop that!”