There was a moment of keenest anxiety on the part of the spectators, during which the smoke, the firing having greatly slackened, rose slowly into the air. The royal army was then seen to be falling back in disorder, leaving heaps of dead at the foot of the ramparts. A sort of breach had been made; a few palisades were torn away, leaving an opening; but that opening bristled with men and pikes and muskets, and amid those men, covered with blood, and yet as calm and cool as if he were a disinterested spectator of the tragedy in which he was playing so terrible a part, stood Richon, holding in his hand an axe all notched by the blows he had struck with it. Some invisible power seemed to protect him, for he was constantly in the thickest of the firing, always in the front rank, always standing erect and with uncovered head, and yet no bullet had struck him, no pike had touched him; he was as invulnerable as he was impassive. Thrice Maréchal de La Meilleraie in person led the royal troops to the assault; thrice the royal troops were beaten back before the eyes of the king and queen. Great tears rolled silently down the pale cheeks of the boy king; Anne of Austria wrung her hands and muttered:-- "Oh! that man! that man! If he ever falls into my hands I will make a terrible example of him!" Luckily flight was close at hand, and spread a veil, so to speak, over the royal blushes. Maréchal de La Meilleraie ordered the bugles to blow the recall. Cauvignac left his post, descended the hill, and sauntered across the field toward the hostelry of Master Biscarros, with his hands in his pockets. "Madame," said Mazarin, waving his hand in Cauvignac's direction, "there's a man who for a little gold would have spared you all this bloodshed." "Nonsense!" said the queen. "Monsieur le Cardinal, that is strange language for an economical man like yourself." "True, madame," rejoined the cardinal: "I know the value of gold, but I know the value of blood also; and at this moment blood is more valuable to us than gold." "Be assured," said the queen, "that the blood that has been shed shall be avenged. Comminges," she added, addressing the lieutenant of her guards, "seek out Monsieur de La Meilleraie and bring him to me." "Bernouin," said the Cardinal to his valet, pointing to Cauvignac, who was within a few steps of the Golden Calf, "do you see that man?" "Yes, monseigneur." "Very good! go to him from me, and bring him secretly to my room to-night." XVI. On the day following the interview with her lover in the Carmelite church, Madame de Cambes waited upon the princess with the intention of performing the promise she had given Canolles.