The Helmet of Navarre Part 80

"As you say, monsieur. It is your job."

I turned, scarce able to believe my luck, and, not daring to run, walked up-stairs again. p.r.i.c.k my ears as I might, I heard no movement after me.

Actually, I had fooled Peyrot. I had gone down to meet my death, and a tune had saved me.

When I reached the uppermost landing, I rushed along the pa.s.sage and into the room, flinging the door shut, locking and bolting it.

They had not begun to fight, but had busied themselves clearing the s.p.a.ce of all obstacles. The table was pushed against the wall in the corner by the door; the chairs were heaped one on another at the end of the room. Both shutters were wide open. M. etienne, bareheaded, in his s.h.i.+rt, stood at guard. Lucas was kneeling on the floor, picking up with scrupulous care some bits of a broken plate. He sprang to his feet at sight of me.

"What is it?" cried M. etienne.

"Cutthroats. They'll be here in a minute."

Even as I spoke, I heard tramping on the stairs below. My slam of the door had warned them that something was wrong.

"Was that your delay?" M. etienne shouted, springing at his foe.

"I play to win!" Lucas answered, smiling.

The blades met; the men circled about and about. Lucas, though he preferred to murder, knew how to duel.

We were doomed. With monsieur's sword for only weapon, we could never hope to pa.s.s the gang. In another minute they would be here to batter the door down and end us. Our consolation lay in killing Lucas first.

Yet as I watched, I feared that M. etienne, in the brief moments that remained to him, could not conquer him, so shrewd and strong was Lucas's fence. Must the scoundrel win? I started forward to play Pontou's trick.

Lucas sought to murder us. Why not we him?

One flash from my lord's eyes, and I retreated in despair. For I knew that did I touch Lucas, M. etienne would let fall his sword, let Lucas kill him. And the bravos were on the last flight.

Was there no escape? There were three doors in the room. One led to the pa.s.sage, one to the closet, the third--I dashed through to find myself in a large empty chamber, a door wide open giving on the pa.s.sage.

Through it I could see the dusky figures of four men running up the stairs.

I was across the room like an arrow, and got the door shut and bolted before they could reach the landing. The next moment some one flung against it. It stood firm. Delaying only a moment to shake it, three of the four I could hear run to the farther door, whence issued the noise of the swords.

I, inside the wall, ran back too. The combat still raged. Neither, that I could see, had gained the least advantage. Outside, the murderers dashed themselves upon the door.

I dragged at the heavy table, and, with a strength that amazed myself, pushed and pulled it before the door. It would make the panels a little firmer.

Was there no escape? None? I ran once more into the second chamber. Its shutters were closed; I threw them open. There was no other door to the room, no hiding-place. There was a chimney, but spanned a foot above the fireplace by two iron bars. The thinnest sweep that ever wielded broom could not have squeezed between them.

In despair, I ran to the window again. Top of the house as it was, I thought I would sooner leap than be stabbed to death. I stuck my head out. It was the same window where I had stood when Grammont seized me.

There, not ten feet away, eight at the most, but a little above me, was the cas.e.m.e.nt of my garret in the Amour de Dieu. Would it be possible to jump and catch the sill? If I did, I could scarce pull myself in.

I looked below me. There swung the sign of the Amour de Dieu. And there beside it stood a homespun figure surely known to me. There was no mistaking that bald pate. I yelled at the top of my lungs:

"Maitre Jacques!"

He looked up, gaping at this voice out of the sky, but, despite his amazement, I saw that he knew me.

"Maitre Jacques! We're being murdered! We can't get out! Help us for the love of Christ! Bring a plank, a rope, to the window there!"

For an instant he stood confounded. Then he vanished into the inn.

I waited, on fire. Still from the next room sounded the clash of steel.

White s.h.i.+rt and black doublet pa.s.sed the door in turn, unflagging, ungaining.

Suddenly came a new noise from the pa.s.sage, of trampling and rending, blows and oaths. My first thought was that they were fighting out there, that rescuers had come. Then, as I listened, I learned better.

Despairing of kicking down the door, they were tearing out a piece of stair-rail for a battering-ram. It would not long stand against that.

I ran back to the window. No Jacques appeared. We were lost, lost!

Hark, from the next room a cry, a fall! Well, were it Lucas's victory, he might kill me as well as another. I walked into the back room. But it was Lucas who lay p.r.o.ne.

"Come, come!" I cried, clutching monsieur's wrist. But he would not till with Lucas's own misericorde he had given him coup de grace.

Cras.h.!.+ Cras.h.!.+ The upper panel s.h.i.+vered in twain. A great splinter six inches wide, hanging from the top, blocked the opening. A hand came through to wrench it away.

M. etienne, across the room at a leap, drove his knife through the hand, nailing it to the wood. On the instant he recognized its owner.

"Good morning, Peyrot. We've recovered the packet."

Not waiting for further amenities, I seized my lord and dashed him into the front room, only a faint hope to lead me, but the oaths of the bravos a good spur. And, St. Quentin be thanked, there in the garret window were Jacques and his tapsters, pus.h.i.+ng a ladder to us.

"Go, monsieur! There are four behind us. Go!"

"You first!"

But I, who had s.n.a.t.c.hed up his sword as he stabbed Lucas, ran back to guard the door. He had the sense to see there was no good arguing.

Crying, "Quick after me, Felix!" he crawled out on the ladder.

Peyrot was released. Another blow from the ram, and the door fell to finders. They leaped in over the table like a freshet over a dam. I darted to the window. M. etienne was in the garret, helping hold the ladder for me. I flung myself upon it all too eagerly. Like a lath it snapped.

x.x.xI

_"The very pattern of a king."_

The next world appeared to be strangely like this. I found myself lying on a straw bed in a little low attic, my head resting comfortably on some one's shoulder, while some one else poured wine down my gullet.

Presently I discovered that Maitre Jacques's was the ministering hand, M. etienne's the shoulder. After all, this was not heaven, but still Paris.

I had no desire to speak so long as the flow of old Jacques's best Burgundy continued; but when he saw my eyes wide open, he stopped, and I said, my voice, to my surprise, very faint and quavery:

"What happened?"

"Dear, brave lad! You fainted!"

My lord's voice was as unsteady as mine.

"But the ladder?" I murmured.