“Holy Cross, Holy Cross!”
Such were the shouts that set the wild cliffs echoing as hundreds of
painted shields came up the pass to meet the dawn. Above, Sir Didcart
with three thousand men had fallen upon those Saracens who had put
Bertrand and his band to rout and had rolled down the rocks on Tristan
at the Gate.
Up the road came Lothaire of the north, his men racing shoulder to
shoulder behind him, panting open-mouthed towards St. Isidore’s Gate.
The great rock with its black pinnacles flashed into view, the platform
strewn with the Christian dead, the narrow rampart piled with the slain.
For one moment Lothaire stood still in the road. Then with a shout he
broke away, waving his men on with his sword.
On the rampart, outlined against the sky, stood a single warrior with
his shield reared up, while his sword flashed and swept from side to
side. A mob of white-robed infidels topped the wall, thrusting at him
with their lances, fearing to close. Near by stood a woman wielding a
spear, with which she strove to beat down the lance points that were
levelled at the man’s body.
“Holy Cross, Holy Cross, God and the Duchess!”
Even as Lothaire’s men charged up, Tristan gave ground, for an arrow had
smitten through the rings of his hauberk, and wounded him sorely in the
breast. A tall Saracen, seeing him stagger, sprang forward and smote at
him with an axe, but fell in turn beneath Tristan’s sword. Yet this was
the last blow Tristan gave on the bloody rampart of St. Isidore’s Gate.
Blanche’s arms caught him as he fell; her body shielded him from the
spears. Lothaire’s men saw their Duchess stand like a noble mother
guarding a son. One outstretched arm pressed the infidels back; the
other was round the stricken man’s shoulders.
Then came the roar of the rising tide as Lothaire and his avengers
reached the Gate and poured up to save the Duchess there. The stalwart
West rolled the Orient back, over the wall and down the road, with
bustling shields and screaming steel. Buckler and lance went down in the
dust, while the dragon of the North heaved on down the pass, its iron
flanks hurling Serjabil’s men over the precipice into the depths
beneath.
Tristan lay under the shadow of the cliff with the Saracen’s arrow
betwixt his ribs. Beside him knelt Blanche, her noble hands dyed with
the blood of the man she loved. Many a rough soldier stood mutely by,
gazing on their lady and the man at her knees.
“Wine,” she called to them almost fiercely, “wine, ye fools, and linen,
bring them. Ha, Walter, come hither, man, unfasten this hauberk.
Thus—thus. Tristan, look up; is it death with you?”
Tristan stared in her face and smiled. They stripped off his hauberk,
rent the clothes beneath till the flesh was bare about the barb.
Blanche, with her teeth set, snapped off the shaft, but dared not do
more, for the blood flowed fast. Her men brought her linen, strips that
they had torn from the robes of the dead Saracens who lay around. Two
soldiers supported Tristan’s shoulders, while Blanche wound the bands
about his body, padding the place where the barb remained, knotting the
linen tight to staunch the flow.
Her men made a litter out of a dozen spears with shields and clothing
laid thereon. Very tenderly they lifted Tristan up, and bore him slowly
down the road from the Saint’s Gate he had held so well. The great peaks
glistened in the sun; the streams sang in the ravines beneath. Thus they
bore Tristan from the mountains towards the woods that clothed the lower
slopes, where they had left a horse litter that they had brought from
Agravale for their lady’s use on the homeward road. Reaching the shadows
of the trees, they laid Tristan within the litter and took the road
towards the north.
Many hours had passed, and the gates of the shrine of St. Geneviève were
opened full towards the west. The evening sunlight streamed within,
warming the white stones in the floor, gilding the carved panels of the
tomb. The wooden roof received the glow reflected from the stones
beneath, so that its colours seemed to breathe with deepening dyes over
the dead saint’s grave. Through the latticed windows roses climbed,
dowering the air with a passionate incense that even in life suggested
death. In the garden the cypresses, like black-robed Fates, spun the
golden threads from the distaff of the west.
Tristan lay before the tomb with his great hands folded upon his breast.
His eyes were turned towards the painted roof, where golden dragons
seemed to move amid stars and moons, and meteor flame. Slowly his breath
flowed in and ebbed under the crossed hands on his breast. Very silent
was the shrine; the light seemed the more reverent for the saint’s tomb
there.
Tristan turned his face towards the door with the wistful look of a
stricken child listening for the sound of a mother’s voice. Little more
than a year had passed away since he had knelt in the chapel of Purple
Isle and watched his arms for Columbe’s sake. Then his heart had echoed
back the sounding surges of the sea. Then in the high tide of youth he
had heard no requiems and no ghastly cries stirring the pulses of the
world. ’Twas different now; all changed the tones, the lights and
shadows, the colours’ scheme. While the sunbeams slept upon the floor
death seemed nearer than life itself.
A figure darkened the gate of the shrine, the figure of a woman who
stood looking towards the tomb. She drew near to the place where Tristan
lay on the warm stones under the painted roof. Blanche’s eyes were full
of pity as she gazed on the strong man lying there, so weak and still
was he, so changed in three days. Was this Tristan who had held the
mountains, whose arm had been mighty in the van of battle? How white he
was since the precious blood had ebbed hour by hour from the barb in his
breast.
She sat herself down on the tomb’s steps beside him and felt that his
eyes were fixed on hers. There was an unuttered prayer upon his lips. He
looked like a man who thirsted for water, but could not crave the cup
from her hands.
“Tristan, what would you?” she asked, reading in his eyes that dim
desire that appealed to the woman in her like the look of a dog.
He moved restlessly upon the bed, his fingers plucking at the hem of the
coverlet.
“I have no heart in me,” he said.
“No heart, Tristan?”
“To ask a boon of you at this last hour. For you have blessed me many
times, nor have I aught but gratitude to give.”
She stretched out a hand and touched his forehead, knelt close to him,
looking sadly in his face.
“What would you have given me, Tristan,” she asked, “other than the
gratitude of a good heart? Am I one to crave weight for weight?”
As she knelt on the stones the sunlight gathered about Tristan’s face,
so that it seemed haloed round with gold.
“My soul wings towards Holy Guard,” he said.
“Ah, Tristan——”
“I would that I might look on Rosamunde again and hear her speak to me
before I die.”
Blanche leant back against the tomb and stared out straight through the
open door. For the moment she saw nothing but the arch of gold, and set
therein a woman’s face, fair with all fairness, rich with youth. In
Blanche’s heart there was sudden bitterness, since she knew that she was
growing old, and that love flew forth to the face of youth. In life this
Rosamunde had stood between, and even in death the man’s last thoughts
flew past her to Holy Guard by the sea.
And then she looked at Tristan’s face, with its wistful eyes and haggard
mouth. How weak he was, how like a child’s this his last desire. Should
she balk him when death stood by? No, by God, she was nobler than that.
“Tristan,” she said, “I will send to Holy Guard and fetch Rosamunde
hither.”
His face brightened strangely at her words, but there was still a cloud
before his eyes.
“Nay, send not to Holy Guard,” he said, “for days will elapse in the
coming and going. And the lamp may be quenched before they return.”
“What would you, then?” she asked him again.
“Lo,” he said, “does not the great Gloire run from Agravale towards the
sea? Set me, I pray thee, in a boat, and let them row me down to the
sea.”
“What of your wound?” she asked once more.
“The blood,” he said, “flows from me still, though I lie here on the
chapel floor. Therefore, I pray thee, bear me hence, that I may come to
Holy Guard before I die.”
“So be it,” she said. “God grant thee life to behold thy love’s face.”