then, at the same moment that I heard a great shouting far away, I lunged swiftly, and by good hap my point entered his throat. With one dreadful sob he fell backwards over the crupper, and the traitor was no more. [Illustration: RAISING HIS SWORD HIGH ABOVE HIS HEAD, HE BROUGHT IT DOWN WITH A VEHEMENT STROKE] It needs not to tell how Biron, with three-score of his choicest cavaliers, rode out from camp with Martigny, having lost some little time in saddling, and came full upon a portion of Lameray’s troop just as they returned to the lane. The King and his little band having sallied forth, and being on the further side of them, they were shut up as in a vice, and full two-score of them were slain. Nor does it become me to relate all that King Henry said to me when he sought me out, I having ridden straight into Arques when I had taken Lameray’s sword as a trophy. I might, if I chose, write myself the Baron de St Aubyn in the peerage of France, since thus royally did the King see fit to reward me; but having been born an Englishman I have no great love for outlandish titles, though, maybe, if I enjoyed a marquis’s rank I might not be so squeamish. Go to my cabinet yonder; there you will find, set together in one place, a white plume, a cloak, and a sword. These the King was pleased to give me. Peradventure in years to come, when your grandsons visit you, you will set these relics in state before them, and tell over again the story of the lonely château and the Baron de Lameray. [Illustration: tailpiece to Second Part] *Interim* A few days after this notable adventure, the Duke of Mayenne encamped over against Arques, and made sundry assaults upon King Henry’s entrenchments, being baffled at all points. Then, hearing that new forces were drawing near from the east, and that five thousand good English soldiers were upon the sea, he withdrew himself into Picardy, the King marching close upon his heels up to the very walls of Paris, the suburbs whereof he took, and gave over to pillage. But winter coming on, he stayed not to open a siege, but withdrew to Tours, sallying forth thence when he heard that Mayenne was again afoot. Many strong places in Normandy yielded themselves up to him, and in the middle of March in the next year he gave battle to Mayenne at Ivry, where, when Fortune seemed to be turning against him, he called cheerfully upon his nobles and gentlemen, and they following him charged into the thick of the fray, his white plume waving in the midst. And among the thirty horsemen that came forth with him out of the mellay was my grandfather, who bore ever after on his neck the scar of a sword cut dealt him on that glorious day.