"If!" Tavannes retorted. "At least, if there be, there be gibbets too!
And I see necks!" he added, leaning forward. "Necks!" And then, with a
look of flame, "Let no man leave this table until I return," he cried,
"or he will have to deal with me. Nay," he continued, changing his tone
abruptly, as the prudence, which never entirely left him--and perhaps the
remembrance of the other's fifty spearmen--sobered him in the midst of
his rage, "I am hasty. I mean not you, M. de Montsoreau! Ride where you
will; ride with me, if you will, and I will thank you. Only remember,
until midnight Angers is mine!"
He was still speaking when he moved from the table, and, leaving all
staring after him, strode down the room. An instant he paused on the
threshold and looked back; then he passed out, and clattered down the
stone stairs. His horse and riders were waiting, but, his foot in the
stirrup, he stayed for a word with Bigot.
"Is it so?" he growled.
The Norman did not speak, but pointed towards the Place Ste.-Croix,
whence an occasional shot made answer for him.
In those days the streets of the Black City were narrow and crooked,
overhung by timber houses, and hampered by booths; nor could Tavannes
from the old Town Hall--now abandoned--see the Place Ste.-Croix. But
that he could cure. He struck spurs to his horse, and, followed by his
ten horsemen, he clattered noisily down the paved street. A dozen groups
hurrying the same way sprang panic-stricken to the walls, or saved
themselves in doorways. He was up with them, he was beyond them! Another
hundred yards, and he would see the Place.
And then, with a cry of rage, he drew rein a little, discovering what was
before him. In the narrow gut of the way a great black banner, borne on
two poles, was lurching towards him. It was moving in the van of a dark
procession of priests, who, with their attendants and a crowd of devout,
filled the street from wall to wall. They were chanting one of the
penitential psalms, but not so loudly as to drown the uproar in the Place
beyond them.
They made no way, and Count Hannibal swore furiously, suspecting
treachery. But he was no madman, and at the moment the least reflection
would have sent him about to seek another road. Unfortunately, as he
hesitated a man sprang with a gesture of warning to his horse's head and
seized it; and Tavannes, mistaking the motive of the act, lost his self-
control. He struck the fellow down, and, with a reckless word, rode
headlong into the procession, shouting to the black robes to make way,
make way! A cry, nay, a shriek of horror, answered him and rent the air.
And in a minute the thing was done. Too late, as the Bishop's Vicar,
struck by his horse, fell screaming under its hoofs--too late, as the
consecrated vessels which he had been bearing rolled in the mud, Tavannes
saw that they bore the canopy and the Host!