"Wakeham," said Sir Geoffrey, in the bridgehead fort, "I may hardly trust my eyes. Here could Philip have given us vast trouble, and now we have none. We will have a camp here quickly, with ten thousand men in it, lest we lose this advantage."
There were boats enough now, and the forces on that bank were growing fast. They were pushing out, moreover, and they were skirmishing briskly with sundry parties of the enemy who seemed to be without a general. Therein was the secret of this matter. Philip of France had been taken unawares by the bold, swift dash of Edward's army. Its vanguard had reached Poissy, mayhap, two days before the French captains had deemed it possible for it to get there.
The night came and went, and it was the next midday when Richard Neville stood on the wharf, watching the London shipwrights ply their tools and swing the timbers into place.
"A man who would move an army," he said aloud, "must needs learn how to build a bridge. I can row a boat, but I must swim better. Those Irish are as nimble as fishes in the water."
A deep voice hailed him at the moment, and he quickly turned.
"Sir Geoffrey!" he exclaimed.
"This to the king," said the marshal, holding out a very small parcel, like a letter. "Come thou not back, save by the king's command, till thou hast carried this also to the earl. Take with thee only a boat load of thy men, but go not alone, for thy errand must not miscarry."
So happened it, then, that only David Griffith and a dozen Welshmen went with him, whose tongue he spoke not; but on the other shore his boat was waited for by the Earl of Warwick and none other, by chance.
"Glad am I," said Richard, giving him Sir Geoffrey's parcel, and the earl read hastily.
"To the king!" he shouted. "I go with thee. The good knight reasons well. We must harry and burn to the Paris streets, that we may know what power is there. He hath word that the allies and the levies of Philip of France are very near to come."