The White Company Read online

  CHAPTER XVI. HOW THE YELLOW COG FOUGHT THE TWO ROVER GALLEYS.

  The three vessels had been sweeping swiftly westwards, the cog stillwell to the front, although the galleys were slowly drawing in uponeither quarter. To the left was a hard skyline unbroken by a sail. Theisland already lay like a cloud behind them, while right in frontwas St. Alban's Head, with Portland looming mistily in the farthestdistance. Alleyne stood by the tiller, looking backwards, the fresh windfull in his teeth, the crisp winter air tingling on his face and blowinghis yellow curls from under his bassinet. His cheeks were flushed andhis eyes shining, for the blood of a hundred fighting Saxon ancestorswas beginning to stir in his veins.

  "What was that?" he asked, as a hissing, sharp-drawn voice seemed towhisper in his ear. The steersman smiled, and pointed with his foot towhere a short heavy cross-bow quarrel stuck quivering in the boards.At the same instant the man stumbled forward upon his knees, and laylifeless upon the deck, a blood-stained feather jutting out from hisback. As Alleyne stooped to raise him, the air seemed to be alive withthe sharp zip-zip of the bolts, and he could hear them pattering on thedeck like apples at a tree-shaking.

  "Raise two more mantlets by the poop-lanthorn," said Sir Nigel quietly.

  "And another man to the tiller," cried the master-shipman.

  "Keep them in play, Aylward, with ten of your men," the knightcontinued. "And let ten of Sir Oliver's bowmen do as much for theGenoese. I have no mind as yet to show them how much they have to fearfrom us."

  Ten picked shots under Aylward stood in line across the broad deck, andit was a lesson to the young squires who had seen nothing of war to notehow orderly and how cool were these old soldiers, how quick the command,and how prompt the carrying out, ten moving like one. Their comradescrouched beneath the bulwarks, with many a rough jest and many a scrapof criticism or advice. "Higher, Wat, higher!" "Put thy body into it,Will!" "Forget not the wind, Hal!" So ran the muttered chorus, whilehigh above it rose the sharp twanging of the strings, the hiss of theshafts, and the short "Draw your arrow! Nick your arrow! Shoot whollytogether!" from the master-bowman.

  And now both mangonels were at work from the galleys, but so coveredand protected that, save at the moment of discharge, no glimpse couldbe caught of them. A huge brown rock from the Genoese sang over theirheads, and plunged sullenly into the slope of a wave. Another from theNorman whizzed into the waist, broke the back of a horse, and crashedits way through the side of the vessel. Two others, flying together,tore a great gap in the St. Christopher upon the sail, and brushed threeof Sir Oliver's men-at-arms from the forecastle. The master-shipmanlooked at the knight with a troubled face.

  "They keep their distance from us," said he. "Our archery is over-good,and they will not close. What defence can we make against the stones?"

  "I think I may trick them," the knight answered cheerfully, and passedhis order to the archers. Instantly five of them threw up their handsand fell prostrate upon the deck. One had already been slain by a bolt,so that there were but four upon their feet.

  "That should give them heart," said Sir Nigel, eyeing the galleys, whichcrept along on either side, with a slow, measured swing of their greatoars, the water swirling and foaming under their sharp stems.

  "They still hold aloof," cried Hawtayne.

  "Then down with two more," shouted their leader. "That will do. Ma foi!but they come to our lure like chicks to the fowler. To your arms, men!The pennon behind me, and the squires round the pennon. Stand fast withthe anchors in the waist, and be ready for a cast. Now blow out thetrumpets, and may God's benison be with the honest men!"

  As he spoke a roar of voices and a roll of drums came from eithergalley, and the water was lashed into spray by the hurried beat of ahundred oars. Down they swooped, one on the right, one on the left, thesides and shrouds black with men and bristling with weapons. In heavyclusters they hung upon the forecastle all ready for a spring--faceswhite, faces brown, faces yellow, and faces black, fair Norsemen,swarthy Italians, fierce rovers from the Levant, and fiery Moors fromthe Barbary States, of all hues and countries, and marked solely by thecommon stamp of a wild-beast ferocity. Rasping up on either side,with oars trailing to save them from snapping, they poured in aliving torrent with horrid yell and shrill whoop upon the defencelessmerchantman.

  But wilder yet was the cry, and shriller still the scream, when thererose up from the shadow of those silent bulwarks the long lines ofthe English bowmen, and the arrows whizzed in a deadly sleet among theunprepared masses upon the pirate decks. From the higher sides of thecog the bowmen could shoot straight down, at a range which was so shortas to enable a cloth-yard shaft to pierce through mail-coats or totransfix a shield, though it were an inch thick of toughened wood.One moment Alleyne saw the galley's poop crowded with rushing figures,waving arms, exultant faces; the next it was a blood-smeared shambles,with bodies piled three deep upon each other, the living cowering behindthe dead to shelter themselves from that sudden storm-blast of death.On either side the seamen whom Sir Nigel had chosen for the purposehad cast their anchors over the side of the galleys, so that the threevessels, locked in an iron grip, lurched heavily forward upon the swell.

  And now set in a fell and fierce fight, one of a thousand of which nochronicler has spoken and no poet sung. Through all the centuries andover all those southern waters nameless men have fought in namelessplaces, their sole monuments a protected coast and an unravagedcountry-side.

  Fore and aft the archers had cleared the galleys' decks, but from eitherside the rovers had poured down into the waist, where the seamen andbowmen were pushed back and so mingled with their foes that it wasimpossible for their comrades above to draw string to help them. Itwas a wild chaos where axe and sword rose and fell, while Englishman,Norman, and Italian staggered and reeled on a deck which was cumberedwith bodies and slippery with blood. The clang of blows, the cries ofthe stricken, the short, deep shout of the islanders, and the fiercewhoops of the rovers, rose together in a deafening tumult, while thebreath of the panting men went up in the wintry air like the smoke froma furnace. The giant Tete-noire, towering above his fellows and cladfrom head to foot in plate of proof, led on his boarders, waving ahuge mace in the air, with which he struck to the deck every man whoapproached him. On the other side, Spade-beard, a dwarf in height, butof great breadth of shoulder and length of arm, had cut a road almostto the mast, with three-score Genoese men-at-arms close at his heels.Between these two formidable assailants the seamen were being slowlywedged more closely together, until they stood back to back under themast with the rovers raging upon every side of them.

  But help was close at hand. Sir Oliver Buttesthorn with his men-at-armshad swarmed down from the forecastle, while Sir Nigel, with his threesquires, Black Simon, Aylward, Hordle John, and a score more, threwthemselves from the poop and hurled themselves into the thickest of thefight. Alleyne, as in duty bound, kept his eyes fixed ever on hislord and pressed forward close at his heels. Often had he heard of SirNigel's prowess and skill with all knightly weapons, but all the talesthat had reached his ears fell far short of the real quickness andcoolness of the man. It was as if the devil was in him, for he spranghere and sprang there, now thrusting and now cutting, catching blows onhis shield, turning them with his blade, stooping under the swing of anaxe, springing over the sweep of a sword, so swift and so erratic thatthe man who braced himself for a blow at him might find him six pacesoff ere he could bring it down. Three pirates had fallen before him, andhe had wounded Spade-beard in the neck, when the Norman giant sprang athim from the side with a slashing blow from his deadly mace. Sir Nigelstooped to avoid it, and at the same instant turned a thrust from theGenoese swordsman, but, his foot slipping in a pool of blood, he fellheavily to the ground. Alleyne sprang in front of the Norman, but hissword was shattered and he himself beaten to the ground by a secondblow from the ponderous weapon. Ere the pirate chief could repeat it,however, John's iron grip fell upon his wrist, and he found that foronce he was in the hands of a
stronger man than himself.

  Fiercely he strove to disengage his weapon, but Hordle John bent his armslowly back until, with a sharp crack, like a breaking stave, it turnedlimp in his grasp, and the mace dropped from the nerveless fingers. Invain he tried to pluck it up with the other hand. Back and back stillhis foeman bent him, until, with a roar of pain and of fury, the giantclanged his full length upon the boards, while the glimmer of a knifebefore the bars of his helmet warned him that short would be his shriftif he moved.

  Cowed and disheartened by the loss of their leader, the Normans hadgiven back and were now streaming over the bulwarks on to their owngalley, dropping a dozen at a time on to her deck. But the anchor stillheld them in its crooked claw, and Sir Oliver with fifty men was hardupon their heels. Now, too, the archers had room to draw their bowsonce more, and great stones from the yard of the cog came thundering andcrashing among the flying rovers. Here and there they rushed with wildscreams and curses, diving under the sail, crouching behind booms,huddling into corners like rabbits when the ferrets are upon them,as helpless and as hopeless. They were stern days, and if the honestsoldier, too poor for a ransom, had no prospect of mercy upon thebattle-field, what ruth was there for sea robbers, the enemies ofhumankind, taken in the very deed, with proofs of their crimes stillswinging upon their yard-arm.

  But the fight had taken a new and a strange turn upon the other side.Spade-beard and his men had given slowly back, hard pressed by SirNigel, Aylward, Black Simon, and the poop-guard. Foot by foot theItalian had retreated, his armor running blood at every joint, hisshield split, his crest shorn, his voice fallen away to a mere gaspingand croaking. Yet he faced his foemen with dauntless courage, dashingin, springing back, sure-footed, steady-handed, with a point whichseemed to menace three at once. Beaten back on to the deck of hisown vessel, and closely followed by a dozen Englishmen, he disengagedhimself from them, ran swiftly down the deck, sprang back into thecog once more, cut the rope which held the anchor, and was back in aninstant among his crossbow-men. At the same time the Genoese sailorsthrust with their oars against the side of the cog, and a rapidlywidening rift appeared between the two vessels.

  "By St. George!" cried Ford, "we are cut off from Sir Nigel."

  "He is lost," gasped Terlake. "Come, let us spring for it." The twoyouths jumped with all their strength to reach the departing galley.Ford's feet reached the edge of the bulwarks, and his hand clutching arope he swung himself on board. Terlake fell short, crashed in among theoars, and bounded off into the sea. Alleyne, staggering to the side, wasabout to hurl himself after him, but Hordle John dragged him back by thegirdle.

  "You can scarce stand, lad, far less jump," said he. "See how the bloodrips from your bassinet."

  "My place is by the flag," cried Alleyne, vainly struggling to breakfrom the other's hold.

  "Bide here, man. You would need wings ere you could reach Sir Nigel'sside."

  The vessels were indeed so far apart now that the Genoese could use thefull sweep of their oars, and draw away rapidly from the cog.

  "My God, but it is a noble fight!" shouted big John, clapping hishands. "They have cleared the poop, and they spring into the waist. Wellstruck, my lord! Well struck, Aylward! See to Black Simon, how he stormsamong the shipmen! But this Spade-beard is a gallant warrior. He rallieshis men upon the forecastle. He hath slain an archer. Ha! my lord isupon him. Look to it, Alleyne! See to the whirl and glitter of it!"

  "By heaven, Sir Nigel is down!" cried the squire.

  "Up!" roared John. "It was but a feint. He bears him back. He driveshim to the side. Ah, by Our Lady, his sword is through him! They cry formercy. Down goes the red cross, and up springs Simon with the scarletroses!"

  The death of the Genoese leader did indeed bring the resistance to anend. Amid a thunder of cheering from cog and from galleys the forkedpennon fluttered upon the forecastle, and the galley, sweeping round,came slowly back, as the slaves who rowed it learned the wishes of theirnew masters.

  The two knights had come aboard the cog, and the grapplings having beenthrown off, the three vessels now moved abreast. Through all the stormand rush of the fight Alleyne had been aware of the voice of GoodwinHawtayne, the master-shipman, with his constant "Hale the bowline!Veer the sheet!" and strange it was to him to see how swiftly theblood-stained sailors turned from the strife to the ropes and back. Nowthe cog's head was turned Francewards, and the shipman walked the deck,a peaceful master-mariner once more.

  "There is sad scath done to the cog, Sir Nigel," said he. "Here is ahole in the side two ells across, the sail split through the centre,and the wood as bare as a friar's poll. In good sooth, I know not what Ishall say to Master Witherton when I see the Itchen once more."

  "By St. Paul! it would be a very sorry thing if we suffered you to bethe worse of this day's work," said Sir Nigel. "You shall take thesegalleys back with you, and Master Witherton may sell them. Then from themoneys he shall take as much as may make good the damage, and the resthe shall keep until our home-coming, when every man shall have hisshare. An image of silver fifteen inches high I have vowed to theVirgin, to be placed in her chapel within the Priory, for that she waspleased to allow me to come upon this Spade-beard, who seemed to me fromwhat I have seen of him to be a very sprightly and valiant gentleman.But how fares it with you, Edricson?"

  "It is nothing, my fair lord," said Alleyne, who had now loosened hisbassinet, which was cracked across by the Norman's blow. Even as hespoke, however, his head swirled round, and he fell to the deck with theblood gushing from his nose and mouth.

  "He will come to anon," said the knight, stooping over him and passinghis fingers through his hair. "I have lost one very valiant and gentlesquire this day. I can ill afford to lose another. How many men havefallen?"

  "I have pricked off the tally," said Aylward, who had come aboard withhis lord. "There are seven of the Winchester men, eleven seamen, yoursquire, young Master Terlake, and nine archers."

  "And of the others?"

  "They are all dead--save only the Norman knight who stands behind you.What would you that we should do with him?"

  "He must hang on his own yard," said Sir Nigel. "It was my vow and mustbe done."

  The pirate leader had stood by the bulwarks, a cord round his arms,and two stout archers on either side. At Sir Nigel's words he startedviolently, and his swarthy features blanched to a livid gray.

  "How, Sir Knight?" he cried in broken English. "Que dites vous? To hang,le mort du chien! To hang!"

  "It is my vow," said Sir Nigel shortly. "From what I hear, you thoughtlittle enough of hanging others."

  "Peasants, base roturiers," cried the other. "It is their fitting death.Mais Le Seigneur d'Andelys, avec le sang des rois dans ses veins! C'estincroyable!"

  Sir Nigel turned upon his heel, while two seamen cast a noose over thepirate's neck. At the touch of the cord he snapped the bonds which boundhim, dashed one of the archers to the deck, and seizing the other roundthe waist sprang with him into the sea.

  "By my hilt, he is gone!" cried Aylward, rushing to the side. "They havesunk together like a stone."

  "I am right glad of it," answered Sir Nigel; "for though it was againstmy vow to loose him, I deem that he has carried himself like a verygentle and debonnaire cavalier."