s glide out of his reach; so that
when he stood at length in the street with the liberated Gertrude, there
was no one near them. Totally forgetting the defenceless situation of
his companion, he was about to spring away in pursuit of the Boar of
Ardennes, as the greyhound tracks the deer, when, clinging to him in her
despair, she exclaimed, "For the sake of your mother's honour, leave
me not here!--As you are a gentleman, protect me to my father's house,
which once sheltered you and the Lady Isabelle!--For her sake leave me
not!"

Her call was agonizing, but it was irresistible; and bidding a mental
adieu, with unutterable bitterness of feeling, to all the gay hopes
which had stimulated his exertion, carried him through that bloody day,
and which at one moment seemed to approach consummation, Quentin,
like an unwilling spirit who obeys a talisman which he cannot resist,
protected Gertrude to Pavillon's house, and arrived in time to defend
that and the Syndic himself against the fury of the licentious soldiery.

Meantime the King and the Duke of Burgundy entered the city on horseback
and through one of the breaches. They were both in complete armour, but
the latter, covered with blood from the plume to the spur, drove his
steed furiously up the breach, which Louis surmounted with the stately
pace of one who leads a procession. They dispatched orders to stop the
sack of the city, which had already commenced, and to assemble their
scattered troops. The Princes themselves proceeded towards the great
church, both for the protection of many of the distinguished inhabitants
who had taken refuge there, and in order to hold a sort of military
council after they had heard high mass.

Busied, like other officers of his rank, in collecting those under his
command, Lord Crawford, at the turning of one of the streets which leads
to the Maes, met Le Balafre sauntering composedly towards the river,
holding in his hand, by the gory locks, a human head with as much
indifference as a fowler carries a game pouch.

"How now, Ludovic!" said his commander; "what are ye doing with that
carrion?"

"It is all that is left of a bit of work which my nephew shaped out and
nearly finished and I put the last hand to," said Le Balafre, "a good
fellow that I dispatched yonder and who prayed me to throw his head into
the Maes.--Men have queer fancies when old Small Back [a cant expression
in Scotland for Death, usually delineated as a skeleton. S.]