For the moment the figure in the black armor had ceased to be the centre about which the human interest of the scene revolved. All heads were turned towards that more imperious shape sweeping in its cloak of gray from the quiet shadows of the orchard trees.

Queenliness in a woman is the counterpart of courage in a man, and with TiphaÏne the very carriage of her head conveyed more magnetism than the choicest smiles of a woman of meaner presence and address. She walked as though these gentlemen of the sword would fall back before her, and fall back they did, leaving her a pathway through the trampled grass. Dubois, standing beside the pile of fagots, had his expectancy ignored as though his knightliness had no standing in the lady’s eyes. Tall as many of the men who watched her, fearless, and forgetful of all feebler issues, she swept on like one who walks towards God’s altar amid the blurred figures of an unseen crowd.

The fifty odd bassinets turned with the unanimity of so many weather-cocks veering with the wind. Their incontinent curiosity trailed at her heels as though she were St. Ursula with eleven thousand virgins following in her wake. Carro de Bodegat alone had the presence to obstruct the path she chose to tread, and to attempt a parley with this imperious perfection of a queen.

“Madame—”

She looked straight into De Bodegat’s sallow face like a red dawn refusing to be smothered by a cloud.

“Room, messire.”

And Bertrand, into whose heart the blood of life seemed bubbling up, saw Carro de Bodegat step back, hunch up his bony shoulders, and venture a side-thrust as she passed.

“I would ask madame her authority—”

“Have patience, messire, and I promise you you shall hear it,” and she left him grimacing in perplexity at Dubois.

To Bertrand the apple-boughs seemed more white against the blue, the grass more green, the gold of the meadows deeper than golden wine. She came near to him, halted, and looked into his face so steadily, and with such an outflashing of her woman’s soul, that he felt like one dazed by some bright light.

“Messires, it has been spread abroad that Bertrand du Guesclin did not fight at Mivoie.”

She spoke as though flinging a challenge at their feet, her voice slow but very quiet. The eyes of the whole company were fixed upon her face, for the strange stateliness of her manner seemed to promise some great confession.

Dubois and his brother in arms bowed to her like men who were half in doubt as to what attitude to assume.

“Madame, we were with the Sire de Beaumanoir at Mivoie—”

“And you did not see the Du Guesclin eagle?”

They admitted the enigma, and were the more puzzled by the expression of consent upon her face.

“Perhaps, messires, you remember my brother’s arms—a silver fesse on a field of blue, the shield of Sir Robin Raguenel, of La BelliÈre, near Dinan?”

“Assuredly.” And they waited to hear more.

“And yet, messires, my brother was not at Mivoie. His heart had failed him, and he had broken troth. You would have found him hiding in the woods near Loudeac.”

Her words won a murmur of astonishment from the listening men, her very calmness carrying conviction to the hearts of not a few.

“Impossible!”

Carro de Bodegat’s face was honestly impertinent in its unbelief.

“How impossible, messire? Should I confess this shame without a cause?”

“Madame, we saw your brother’s shield, and heard him answer to his name.”

“Then the deceit was the braver in its thoroughness. Know, gentlemen, and Bretons—all, that it was Bertrand du Guesclin who fought in my brother’s stead!”

Her words fell like stones into a pool, making the waters swing into merging circles that spread and melted into a vague suggestion of unrest.

“Messires,” and she looked round at the listening faces with a brave lifting of the head, “I loved my brother, and I was afraid, for he was young and not stiffened into manhood when the news came of the gathering at Mivoie. It was then that Bertrand lodged at La BelliÈre with us a night, and since he was my friend I gave my brother to him with these words: ‘Look to the lad, because I love him, and because he is our father’s only son.’ Little did I think that Bertrand du Guesclin would set so great a price upon my words, and bear the shame to save a coward.”

She ceased, and looked round her at the faces of those who listened. Only on Carro de Bodegat’s face did she find the unhallowed glimmer of a prurient sneer.

“If this is the truth—”

It was Dubois, the Breton bear, who came forward several paces from where he stood.

“It is the truth. Ask the Sire de Tinteniac, ask Robin Raguenel, for you will find him among the monks of the abbey of Lehon. Shame drove my brother there when he could no longer bear the burden of a lie.”

Not a man doubted her in the sincerity of his heart. Carro de Bodegat alone remained grudging and ungenerous to the end.

“Madame, we have yet to hear the meaning of this man’s hiding at Pontivy.”

“This man—indeed!” and she let her scorn flash out at him. “Come, Messire Carro de Bodegat, I will ask you a question in return. Who was it killed Croquart and his three men single-handed when you were hunting them with fifty Bretons at your back?”

The laugh was against De Bodegat. The rest had drawn aside from him. He stood alone, and would not suffer his jealousy to be convinced.

“Madame, you have not answered me.”

“I have no wish to answer you, messire. Bertrand, who is no traitor, will answer for himself.”

The Bretons cheered her. De Bodegat, remembering Croquart’s mangled neck, looked sullenly at Bertrand and said nothing.

The pent-up ardor of the men burst out at last. All hands were towards Bertrand, and they crowded about him, strenuous to make amends. It was Dubois who was the first to do a brave man’s penance for a savage wrong. And yet another was before him in the act, for Tinteniac, long a listener, had pushed through the crowd and rushed on Du Guesclin with a great hearted-shout of joy.

“Bertrand, Brother Bertrand, the prize at Mivoie should have been yours—not mine.”

“Sire,” and the strong man’s head was bowed at last so that it rested on Tinteniac’s shoulder—“sire, I am a great fool, but—God help me—I shall play the woman.”