Some of our peasants who loved Sir Geoffrey told us the news, though of course we could not expect them to stand by us openly; we were the weaker side, and no Grifon will openly support the weaker side. What they told us was very grave; it seemed that we had seen only half the might the Emperor Michael was bringing against Lamorie. Besides a fleet of experienced pirates, who would pounce on the islands if they were left undefended, that un-Christian Emperor had sent into our Christian land a great host of infidel Turks. Another three thousand of these horse-bowmen had struck north into the central plateau, pillaging as they rode to ky siege to La Grite.
For ten days we sat in Carytena, listening to news of disaster. There was only one ray of light; the local peasants, for what they were worth, now fervently supported our side. If you introduce Turkish horsemen into a prosperous country you cannot expect even your co-religionists to like you. Fugitive peasants would sometimes bring to the castle the head of a Turkish straggler, and receive in exchange a few silver pieces; but usually it was the other way round. Turks cannot plunder a country without killing every man they meet; populous hamlets had been wiped out to the last baby.
It was disconcerting that we had no news of the Prince. The whole force of Lamorie was concentrated on the isthmus, not more than three days' ride from La Grite. If Prince William did not march to relieve de Tournay's castle, the head of one of the twelve Baronies of the Conquest, he must believe himself too weak to meet the Grifons in the open field. Meanwhile in Carytena we could do nothing, except keep our gates shut and look as menacing as we could on the battlements. I myself was almost fit to ride again, for the bone in my forearm knitted rapidly; but Sir John would not allow me to carry a call for help to the Prince. He said that our plight must be known, or guessed, and that Prince William was an experienced leader who must have good reason for all he did. I think that at bottom Sir John was ashamed to call attention to the danger of Carytena, deserted by its lord in the stress of invasion; but of course he was too proud to say so.
In this time of terror Melisande's calm fortitude was a great consolation to me.
"I never supposed I was immortal," she said with a shrug as we discussed the situation on a windy corner of the battlements. "I shall take my turn at throwing down stones when the assault comes. As a last resort I have heard you can melt lead from the roof and drop it on the scaling ladders."
"That would be the end of Carytena as a habitable building," I interrupted.
She shrugged and went on. "What happens after that depends on who captures the castle. If it's Grifons I can talk to them in their own language, and anyway they usually spare women and children unless they are sadly out of temper. If it's Turks I must not fall into their hands alive. That's not difficult to manage. If I brandish a knife some Turk will cut me down. I shall look after the younger children. Sophie and little William can help me to throw stones; they'll enjoy it. Then if it's Turks I shall see that they fall off the battlements at the last minute, if it's Grifons they can ask for mercy and perhaps get it. But Geoffrey is old enough to decide his own future. He will be eight next birthday—if he has another birthday."
"He can manage his crossbow," I said proudly. "The Wallach dirks in the armoury are not too heavy for him. He will make a good end, I am sure. I may not be there to see it, unfortunately. I'm sorry it's come to this, my dear. Perhaps I should have sent you all off to Italy while there was time."
"Don't be sorry for us. The children and I were born in Romanie, and it is right that we should die in the land of our birth. We may even qualify for the Crusading pardon, especially if it's Turks who break in. It won't last long, and then we shall be very well."
But the little group of horse and foot who approached Carytena next morning were not the vanguard of the besiegers, as at first we feared. They were the scanty invalid garrison of La Grite, who had yielded their unbreached castle in return for a promise that they might retire in safety. We thought it a shameful bargain, though the middle of a war was no time for saying so; but they had an excuse of sorts. They explained that the foolish Sir Geoffrey de Tournay had left his castle unprovisioned; it lay so far from Mistra that he never expected the enemy to reach it, and the muster at Chorinte needed his bacon and biscuit. Now a garrison of Grifons had been installed in La Grite (and indeed the Grifons hold it to this day), but the main body of Turkish raiders had turned southward to join up with the Sebastocrator near Andreville.
Sir John called a meeting of all the Franks in the castle. He had to call it in two shifts, or the walls would have been left unguarded; but I believe he made exactly the same speech twice. Melisande and I heard the first version.
"Gentlemen," he began, "it is our duty to uphold the Frankish cause here in Romanie, and I have a plan for it. But since the plan is very desperate I shall first explain it to you, and carry it out only if you agree. This is what I propose: We can't let the Sebastocrator capture Andreville and the Princess Anna. If he does all the Grifons of the land will forsake us, seeing us helpless against the great army of the Emperor. So I shall take every horseman from the garrisons, young or old, sick or crippled, and charge the Grifon host before Andreville. It means that our castles will be left unguarded, it means staking everything on one throw. But if it fails we shall be no worse off than if we sit in our castles waiting for the Grifons to capture them one by one, as they have already captured La Grite. Will you follow me?"
"How many men can you gather?" asked a fugitive from La Grite.
"Does it matter? A hundred? Two hundred? I shall collect every Frank from the garrisons, but still the Grifons will outnumber us." Sir John shrugged his shoulders.
"May I go?" I whispered to Melisande beside me.
"Of course. Volunteer at once, to persuade the laggards. If the worst comes to the worst you will die in hot blood, and the undefended women and children will perhaps get mercy from the Grifons." Melisande was the best kind of wife for a household knight.
Next day we rode out from Carytena, a column of seventy mounted men and boys. I was surprised at our numbers as we clattered over the bridge, but the fugitives from La Grite had been added to the knights, sergeants and pages of Carytena. Even young Geoffrey Briwerr rode in the rear, astride a quiet hackney; he wore a leather jacket and a light steel cap, for in the armoury there was no mail small enough to fit him. But his short boar-spear could kill a Grifon if he shut his eyes and galloped into him.
Among these seventy there were only a dozen mailed knights mounted on trained destriers; and all of us were disabled in some way, by age or wounds or infirmity, I was one of the fittest, though my left arm was still weak and painful. I rode immediately behind Sir John; who sat straight in his saddle and looked most warlike, though he could not hold a weapon in his rheumatic right hand.
We rode first south-east and then north and then west, making a wide circle before we returned to the valley of the lower Charbon. The enemy had passed on westward and the country seemed deserted, but it was astonishing how many Franks we picked up from Bucelet and the other castles or from isolated watch-towers where they had taken refuge from the invasion. There was something the matter with every one of them, too old or too young or too sick for active service; that was.why they had not joined the Prince's muster at the isthmus. But they were willing to ride with us for one last charge in the open rather than wait under a roof for their throats to be cut; and even a sick Frank is worth a good many sound Grifons.
The enemy were encamped not far from Andreville, in the plain where the River Charbon issues from the mountains. As the crow flies they were not more than a long day's ride from Carytena, though we had ridden for five days to catch up with them. The country had been so ravaged that we were short of food, and without grooms or footmen we were tired by the unaccustomed work of looking after our own horses. But our numbers had grown remarkably. When Sir John counted heads he found we were 312 horsemen strong, and 42 of these were genuine dubbed knights in complete mail.
On the other
hand friendly peasants informed us that the combined force of the enemy, Grifons and Turks encamped side by side, was at least six thousand men. These peasants were full of the latest Turkish atrocity; the infidels had sacked and burned the Benedictine monastery of Our Lady of Isova. Turks enjoy sacking a Christian shrine, but as a rule their Grifon paymasters restrain them. The Sebastocrator had not attempted to save Isova, holding, like many Grifons, that Latin monks are more hateful than infidels.
That was not how the local peasants saw it. Unfitted by lack of education to understand the niceties of schism, they had a genuine reverence for Our Lady and a dislike of infidels who sack her shrines. Some of them came to our camp armed with bows and ox-goads; and though we could not put them in our line of battle they were helpful in looking after our horses. Above all they raised our spirits, prophesying that Turks who had insulted Our Lady would come to a bad end.
We passed the night only two miles away from the great Grifon army, whose camp we could see spread before us in the plain below. They seemed unaware of our presence; I suppose because their Turkish light horse would not patrol to the rear, where the villages had akeady been plundered and there was nothing to be taken. In any case, we were so few that we did not look like an army; the hills were dotted with the camp-fires of unarmed fugitives.
A sound night's rest would have helped us to fight; but no one has the strength of mind to pass what may be his last night on earth in deep unconsciousness. Even a warrior who is not worried about the Judgement wants to look at the stars for what may be the last time. There was a good supper for us, and peasants to see to our horses; so we were better off than we had been for the last three days. But no one slept. After I had made my confession I went over to the fire where the pages were gathered, to see how my son was facing his first battle. But except for the usual good wishes I could find nothing to say to him. There was nothing to be said. A boy in his eighth year should not be sent into battle; but if Franks wish to rule in Romanie that is how they must conduct their lives. Geoffrey was frightened, of course; but no more frightened than I was, and pride would keep him in the ranks when the time came. After I had left him I found his little hackney in the horse-lines, and gave it a loaf of barley saved from my supper. It was a well-made little gelding, which looked as though it could gallop; a good feed might give it the bottom to get away if we were put to flight.
By first light the field-masses were finished, and as the east began to glow we formed up; a front rank of mailed knights, then the sergeants, with the half-armed volunteers in the rear. But every man was mounted, and we could charge in one body.
Sir John de Catabas took post three lengths in front of the first rank. While he spoke to us a peasant carried his great helm and held the bridle of his destrier. He made a very good speech. Later I was amused to hear it reproduced in verse as rhetorical and rhythmic as a bishop's Easter sermon. That was not how it sounded at the time. Sir John took a romantic view of the glory of knighthood, but he had little formal education.
"Well, you cripples," he began, "the real warriors of Lamorie have gone off with Prince William to the isthmus, leaving us to look after their homes for them. If we were fit for battle we wouldn't be here at all. That's something to be proud of, and by tonight we shall feel very proud. We are going to scatter that Grifon army. They have a lot of men in camp over there, but what sort of men? Hired soldiers, infidels, heathen, schismatics, renegades, outcasts from their own people, speaking different tongues, serving the Sebastocrator only because he pays them money. He hasn't paid them to die for him, and they won't."
"But we are the Franks of Romanie, children of the heroes who conquered this land. We speak one language, we fight in the same way, we know one another, we serve the same lord. The Prince left us at home, thinking us unfit for war. Let's show him his mistake. Let's do a famous deed of arms, something that will be remembered for as long—as long—as long as Noah's Ark rests on Ararat."
Evidently Sir John had been trying to think of some famous battle of the past, and could not name one.
"Now then," he went on, "I ride in front. That's my privilege. The bother is that I can't hold a weapon. So I shall carry the banner of Villehardouin, and it must be strapped to my wrist. I shall bear it straight to the tent of the Sebastocrator, and then someone must unfasten it and plant it in the ground. Wait a minute while I get ready, and then follow me."
That is the right sort of speech to make before battle, much more inspiring than formal rhetoric.
After the banner had been strapped to his hand a mounted page fastened his helm for him (I wish it had been my Geoffrey, but it was not). Under the great swan-neck crest Sir John looked nearer eight than seven feet high. As he wheeled his destrier to face the foe he gave a great cry of Passavant, Get Forra'd, and we all took it up, digging in our spurs.
As we settled down into a steady canter the sun rose through a nick in the hills behind us; it shone on our leader's white surcoat with its red Crusading cross. Our Grifon sergeants called on Our Lady in the high nasal tone they use for religious invocations, and that reminder that we were avenging the desecration of her shrine lent us courage; but the shouts of Passavant were louder. The army of the Sebastocrator would know that Frankish knights were charging down on them almost before they could see the dust of our destriers.
The invaders were still folding their blankets and lighting their breakfast fires. Their horses stood unsaddled in the picket-lines, or grazed under guard near the camp. But Grifons always take precautions against surprise, much more thoroughly than do Franks. There was a standing guard of about a thousand men, mounted and armed and ready for immediate action. When we were five hundred yards from the camp this guard rode to encounter us.
Luckily they were Grifon light horse, carrying lance and sword; not Turks, whose arrows might have been dangerous in the open plain. They rode against us pluckily enough, but what can a thousand Grifons do against three hundred Franks? Sir John galloped right through them without a scratch. He sat erect, the banner of Villehardouin streaming above and the angry red beak of his swan-crest reaching nearly as high as the banner-staff. Not one of them would break a lance on the shield of that grim figure ; at the last moment they opened their ranks to let him through.
With the rest of us they were more obstinate. The first to come at me was a gentleman, as I could see from the steel-headed mace he carried instead of a lance. My little mare was too light to bowl him over, horse and man, in true Frankish fashion. But she was very easy to guide. At the last moment I swerved, to meet him nearside to nearside; as he raised his mace my lance caught him under the arm, where all mail must be weak.
Then other horses were ridden against me and Sylvia came to a stand. I dropped my lance to draw my sword. By swinging it in a circle I cleared a space. It is dangerous to let Grifons get too close, for they have an unchivalrous habit of stabbing at the horse rather than the man. For light horse these people were very stubborn. They halted the whole column, though we had charged into them at speed.
But at close quarters our heavier swords and mail of proof gave us the advantage. A hundred of them must have been on the ground by the time their centre broke and the two wings galloped clear. A furlong of trampled earth stood empty between us and the enemy camp, empty save for the tall erect figure of Sir John, cantering alone towards the great multi-coloured pavilion of the Sabastocrator.
That was the end of the battle; though there was still a good deal of galloping and jostling, and killing of fleeing foes who showed us only their unguarded backs. Nobody likes to cut down unresisting fugitives, or at least I personally don't like it. But often it is the only way to get full value out of a victory; and these were the men who had murdered our peasants and pillaged the shrine of Our Lady of Isova.
The dismounted Grifons in the camp never attempted a stand. Each man grabbed what he could pick up and ran off towards the horses. As we blundered among the tents we found the embers of their cooking fires a greater obs
tacle than all those thousands of hired soldiers. Grifons do not always fight badly, as I know better than most men. But we had taken them by surprise, and panic is often infectious. They ran like sheep, crying that St. George was leading angels against them.
We had none of us expected to win. I suppose Sir John had made up his mind to perish gloriously in the midst of the foe. When he realised that we had won after all he pulled up; among the tents we caught up with him, and in a body we all surged towards the great eagle-banner which marked imperial headquarters.
We very nearly caught the Sebastocrator in his nightgown. As a rule Grifon commanders are hard-working men, who get up early; but Constantine Palaeologue was the Emperor's brother, and could I suppose take liberties. His pavilion was pitched in the middle of the camp, so that it took us some minutes to reach it. When we got there the opening was crammed with unarmed servants, who fell on their knees to kiss the legs of our horses in an abject desire for mercy. They got it, too, I am glad to say; such creatures are not normally worth robbing and a knight gains no glory by killing them.
Sir John halted. A sergeant unfastened the banner of Villehardouin and fixed it in the earth beside the Double Eagle. We waited eagerly. We knew that the camp would be full of valuable plunder, but it seemed discourteous to begin the sack before our leader had taken possession of the captured headquarters. With the entry crowded with servants, we none of us supposed that there would be anyone in the back of the tent.
Behind the luxurious silken walls there was a sudden scurry, and a smaJl bay hackney whizzed through the opening as though a lighted torch were fastened to its tail. He was one of those beautiful little racehorses that Saracen princes sometimes give away as presents; though they give only stallions, so that without mares we cannot breed them for ourselves. This delightful little horse was unsaddled; on his bare back sat the Sebastocrator, naked except for a nightgown of green silk trimmed with purple.
Lord Geoffrey's Fancy Page 22
