CHAPTER III
THE BATTLE OF SHOREBY (_concluded_)
Dick, once more left to his own counsels, began to look about him. Thearrow-shot had somewhat slackened. On all sides the enemy were fallingback; and the greater part of the market-place was now left empty, thesnow here trampled into orange mud, there splashed with gore, scatteredall over with dead men and horses, and bristling thick with featheredarrows.
On his own side the loss had been cruel. The jaws of the little streetand the ruins of the barricade were heaped with the dead and dying; andout of the hundred men with whom he had begun the battle, there were notseventy left who could still stand to arms.
At the same time the day was passing. The first reinforcements might belooked for to arrive at any moment; and the Lancastrians, already shakenby the result of their desperate but unsuccessful onslaught, were in anill temper to support a fresh invader.
There was a dial in the wall of one of the two flanking houses; andthis, in the frosty, winter sunshine, indicated ten of the forenoon.
Dick turned to the man who was at his elbow, a little insignificantarcher, binding a cut in his arm.
"It was well fought," he said, "and, by my sooth, they will not chargeus twice."
"Sir," said the little archer, "ye have fought right well for York, andbetter for yourself. Never hath man in so brief space prevailed sogreatly on the duke's affections. That he should have entrusted such apost to one he knew not is a marvel. But look to your head, SirRichard! If ye be vanquished--ay, if ye give way one foot's-breadth--axeor cord shall punish it; and I am set, if ye do aught doubtful, I willtell you honestly, here to stab you from behind."
Dick looked at the little man in amaze.
"You!" he cried. "And from behind!"
"It is right so," returned the archer; "and because I like not theaffair I tell it you. Ye must make the post good, Sir Richard, at yourperil. O, our Crookback is a bold blade and a good warrior; but whetherin cold blood or in hot, he will have all things done exact to hiscommandment. If any fail or hinder, they shall die the death."
"Now, by the saints!" cried Richard, "is this so? And will men followsuch a leader?"
"Nay, they follow him gleefully," replied the other; "for if he be exactto punish, he is most open-handed to reward. And if he spare not theblood and sweat of others, he is ever liberal of his own, still in thefirst front of battle, still the last to sleep. He will go far, willCrookback Dick o' Gloucester!"
The young knight, if he had before been brave and vigilant, was now allthe more inclined to watchfulness and courage. His sudden favour, hebegan to perceive, had brought perils in its train. And he turned fromthe archer, and once more scanned anxiously the market-place. It layempty as before.
"I like not this quietude," he said. "Doubtless they prepare us somesurprise."
And, as if in answer to his remark, the archers began once more toadvance against the barricade, and the arrows to fall thick. But therewas something hesitating in the attack. They came not on roundly, butseemed rather to await a further signal.
Dick looked uneasily about him, spying for a hidden danger. And sureenough, about half-way up the little street, a door was suddenly openedfrom within, and the house continued, for some seconds, and both bydoor and window, to disgorge a torrent of Lancastrian archers. These, asthey leaped down, hurriedly stood to their ranks, bent their bows, andproceeded to pour upon Dick's rear a flight of arrows.
At the same time, the assailants in the market-place redoubled theirshot, and began to close in stoutly upon the barricade.
Dick called down his whole command out of the houses, and facing themboth ways, and encouraging their valour both by word and gesture,returned as best he could the double shower of shafts that fell abouthis post.
Meanwhile house after house was opened in the street, and theLancastrians continued to pour out of the doors and leap down from thewindows, shouting victory, until the number of enemies upon Dick's rearwas almost equal to the number in his face. It was plain that he couldhold the post no longer; what was worse, even if he could have held it,it had now become useless; and the whole Yorkist army lay in a postureof helplessness upon the brink of a complete disaster.
The men behind him formed the vital flaw in the general defence; and itwas upon these that Dick turned, charging at the head of his men. Sovigorous was the attack that the Lancastrian archers gave ground andstaggered, and, at last, breaking their ranks, began to crowd back intothe houses from which they had so recently and so vaingloriouslysallied.
Meanwhile the men from the market-place had swarmed across theundefended barricade, and fell on hotly upon the other side; and Dickmust once again face about, and proceed to drive them back. Once againthe spirit of his men prevailed; they cleared the street in a triumphantstyle, but even as they did so the others issued again out of thehouses, and took them, a third time, upon the rear.
The Yorkists began to be scattered; several times Dick found himselfalone among his foes and plying his bright sword for life; severaltimes he was conscious of a hurt. And meanwhile the fight swayed to andfro in the street without determinate result.
Suddenly Dick was aware of a great trumpeting about the outskirts of thetown. The war-cry of York began to be rolled up to heaven, as by manyand triumphant voices. And at the same time the men in front of himbegan to give ground rapidly, streaming out of the street and back uponthe market-place. Some one gave the word to fly. Trumpets were blowndistractedly, some for a rally, some to charge. It was plain that agreat blow had been struck, and the Lancastrians were thrown, at leastfor the moment, into full disorder, and some degree of panic.
And then, like a theatre trick, there followed the last act of ShorebyBattle. The men in front of Richard turned tail, like a dog that hasbeen whistled home, and fled like the wind. At the same moment therecame through the market-place a storm of horsemen, fleeing and pursuing,the Lancastrians turning back to strike with the sword, the Yorkistsriding them down at the point of the lance.
Conspicuous in the mellay, Dick beheld the Crookback. He was alreadygiving a foretaste of that furious valour and skill to cut his wayacross the ranks of war, which, years afterwards, upon the field ofBosworth, and when he was stained with crimes, almost sufficed to changethe fortunes of the day and the destiny of the English throne. Evading,striking, riding down, he so forced and so manoeuvred his stronghorse, so aptly defended himself, and so liberally scattered death tohis opponents, that he was now far ahead of the foremost of his knights,hewing his way, with the truncheon of a bloody sword, to where LordRisingham was rallying the bravest. A moment more and they had met; thetall, splendid, and famous warrior against the deformed and sickly boy.
Yet Shelton had never a doubt of the result; and when the fight nextopened for a moment, the figure of the earl had disappeared; but still,in the first of the danger, Crookback Dick was launching his big horseand plying the truncheon of his sword.
Thus, by Shelton's courage in holding the mouth of the street againstthe first attack, and by the opportune arrival of his seven hundredreinforcements, the lad, who was afterwards to be handed down to theexecration of posterity under the name of Richard III., had won hisfirst considerable fight.