“WESTERMAN.”
CHAPTER IX. — SANTERRE.
Santerre and Adolphe Denot left the main army at Thouars, and made their way to Argenton with about four thousand men. From thence, Durbellière was distant about four leagues; and Santerre lost no time in making his preparations for destroying that château, as Westerman was at the same moment doing at Clisson. Generally speaking, the people of the towns, even in La Vendée sided with the republicans; but the people of Argenton were supposed to be royalists, and Santerre therefore gave positive orders that every house in it should be destroyed. He did not, however, himself want to see the horrid work done, but hurried on to Durbellière, that he might, if possible, surprise the Vendean chiefs, whom he believed to be staying there. About one hundred and fifty men followed him, and the remainder of the army was to march on to Bressuire, as soon as Argenton was in ashes.
Santerre, since he had left the company of the other Generals at Thouars, had become more familiar and confidential with Denot, and rode side by side with him from Argenton, talking freely about the manners of the country, and the hopes of the royalists, till he succeeded in getting the traitor into good humour, and obtaining from him something like a correct idea of the state of the country.
“And this is the parish of St. Aubin?” said Santerre, as they drew near to Durbellière.
“Yes,” said Denot, “this is the parish of St. Aubin; and the estate of the Larochejaquelins.”
“And they are popular with the people?” said Santerre. “They must have been well loved, or they would not have been so truly followed.”
Denot blushed at the heavy accusation against himself which these words conveyed; but he made no answer.
“And this old man, my friend?” said Santerre, “this ancient cripple that you tell me of? he is too old, too infirm, I suppose, to care much about this revolt?”
“Not at all,” said Denot; “no one in the country is more anxious for success than the old Marquis.”
“There you are again, friend,” said Santerre, “I know you’ll get your neck into danger. Have I not told you that the Republic knows nothing of Marquises?”
“I only called him by the name he goes by, as you’d call a man Peter, if his name were Peter. I didn’t mean to say he was a Marquis,” said Denot, excusing himself.
“But you mustn’t say so at all, unless you speak of him as a criminal, as you would speak of a perjurer, or a parricide. But as to this foolish old man; is he not doting? If I thought that, I might perhaps be excused in sparing him.”
“Doting!” said Denot; “not at all; he has all his faculties as much as you or I.”
Santerre gave a look of disgust at the wretch, who would not even follow his hint by giving such an account as might spare the life of the old man, who had been his host, his guardian, and his friend. He said nothing further, however, but trotted on quickly, till the cherry groves of Durbellière were in sight, and then he halted to give his final orders to his men, and make arrangements that the house should be surrounded.
“You remember our bargain, citizen General?” said Denot.
“What bargain?” asked the brewer.
“Why, about the young lady; the girl, you know,” replied the other. “No one is to interfere between me and Agatha Larochejaquelin. She is to be my prize and my reward.”
“I will be as good as my word,” said Santerre, “as long as you are true to yours; but I own I pity the young lady the treatment she is likely to receive from her lover,” and as he spoke, he rode up to the front door of the house, accompanied by Denot and a company of men on horseback.
The immediate arrival of republican soldiers in the neighbourhood of Durbellière was neither expected, or even feared by the inhabitants of the château, or it would not have been left by Henri, as it had been, perfectly undefended. The truth was this: the royalists had hitherto been so very generally successful against the republicans; and that, when every odds of number, arms, and position had been in favour of their enemies, that they had learnt to look with contempt upon the blues, as they called them. Hitherto the royalists had always been the attacking party; the republicans had contented themselves with endeavouring to keep their position within the towns; and when driven from thence, had retreated altogether out of the revolted district. Except lately at Nantes, the Vendeans had as yet incurred no great reverse; they had not, therefore, learnt to fear that their houses would be attacked and burnt; their corn and cattle destroyed; and even their wives and children massacred. The troops which had now been dispatched by the Convention for the subjection of the country, were of a very different character from those with whom the Vendeans had as yet contended, and the royalists were not long before they experienced all the horrors of a civil war, in which quarter was refused them by their enemies, and mercy even to children was considered as a crime.
When Santerre rode up to the door of the château, ten men might have taken possession of Durbellière. It was a fine July evening, about seven o’clock. The old Marquis had been wheeled in his easy chair out of the house, to the top of the broad steps which led from the back of the château into the garden. Agatha was sitting at his feet on the top step, reading to him, and the little Chevalier Mondyon, who retained no semblance of the soldier about his person, except the red scarf round his waist, was seated straddle-legged atop of one of the huge white lions which guarded the entrance.
“Agatha, I hear horsemen,” said the boy, jumping off his seat. “There—there—quite plain!”
“It is Henri and Charles coming from Clisson,” said Agatha.
“If it be, they have a troop of cavalry with them,” said the Chevalier. “Perhaps it’s the Prince de Talmont, for I think they have not so many horsemen with them in the south,” and the little Chevalier ran out to greet, as he thought, his gallant friends.
“Whoever they be, Agatha,” said the old Marquis, “give them a warm welcome if they come in the King’s name. They will know that I cannot rise to meet them, but make them welcome to everything in and about the château.”
Agatha had closed her book, and was rising to execute her father’s wishes, when Momont, the grey-haired butler, hurrying round from the kitchen-door as fast his old legs would carry him, screamed out: “The blues! the blues!”
Agatha, who was in the act of entering the house as she heard the fearful cry, turned instantly back to her father’s side. She was deadly pale, but she spoke not a word. She grasped her father’s hand, and fixed herself close to his chair, determined in that position to await the worst that her enemies could do her.
“Run, Agatha, run,” said the Marquis, “into the garden, my dear love. The gate will be open at the back. Run, Agatha, for your life!” Agatha, however, did not stir.
“Do you hear me, Agatha?” continued the old man, wildly supplicating her to go from him. “Do you hear me, my daughter? If you would have my blessing before I die, do as I bid you now. What are my grey hairs to your young life, that you should sacrifice yourself for me?”
It was of no avail, for the daughter stood fast by her disabled father’s side, grasping his right hand so that nothing should tear her from him, and turning her beautiful face towards the house, watching for the approach of her enemies. Nor had she to watch long; before the Chevalier had been gone five minutes, Santerre, with his sword drawn, tramped heavily through the house, followed by Denot, and a score of his men. The door from the salon to the garden steps was open, and without waiting a moment in the house, he marched through and confronted Agatha and her father.
“Here is your damsel safe, at any rate, friend Denot,” said Santerre, “and a pretty girl she is too, but a bitter royalist, no doubt, by the proud turn of her white neck.”
Denot did not immediately follow Santerre on to the steps. He had firmly resolved to thrust himself upon Agatha as a conqueror; to rush upon her as an eagle upon its prey, and to carry her off with a strong hand, disregarding her cries, as the eagle disregards the bleating of the lamb; but the first glance he had got of his victim somehow startled his resolve, and scared the blood from his cheek, and almost from his heart. When Santerre, however, called to him, he was obliged to follow; and then, making fearful grimaces with his lips, and scowling with his eyes, he stalked out before the astonished father and daughter.
“Yes, Agatha,” he said, looking full upon her, but not daring to turn an eye upon the countenance of her much more indignant father, “yes, Agatha, I have come, as I told you I would come—I have come to claim you, and no power shall now gainsay me. I have come to seize you as my own; to take you with a strong hand, and an out-stretched arm. My prayers were of no avail; you shall find that my sword is more powerful. When last I sought you, it was as a suppliant, I now come for you as a conqueror. Come, Agatha, you are now mine. All the powers of earth shall not rescue you from my arms.”
“You appear to me, Sir, to come as a traitor,” said Agatha.
“A good republican, my dear,” said Santerre: “he comes as a good republican.”
Agatha did not deign to make any further reply, but as Santerre and the men had now left the steps and gone into the house, Denot put his hand on her arm to lead her away from her father’s side.
“Leave her alone,” shouted the old man, now speaking for the first time since his eyes had rested on the republican soldiers. “Leave her alone, thou false wretch, thou basest of all miscreants. Touch her not, or—or—,” and the poor Marquis strove in vain to rise from his chair to his daughter’s help. “Momont, Chapeau, Arthur—Arthur,” he halloed. “My daughter—my daughter, oh! my daughter!”
No one, however, came to his aid, and Agatha, finding resistance to be in vain, suffered Denot to lead her into the house, without uttering another word.
Not the slightest resistance was made to Santerre and his men; he took possession of the château without a word even being said to stop him. The servant girls hid themselves in the garrets, but were soon brought down again, and bade to set quiet in the hall, till their fate should have been decided on. Momont attempted to conceal himself in the garden, but he was soon found and brought back again, and stationed among the women. Chapeau was not seen at all, and even the little Chevalier was missing for a time, though he returned of his own accord before Santerre had been long in possession of the place.
Santerre seated himself with two of his officers in the largest of the salons, and ordered that the old Marquis should be brought before him. He was rather perplexed as to what he should next do; his orders were to destroy everything—houses, property, and life; to spare neither age, sex, nor imbecility; and Santerre, undertaking the commission, had thought, in his republican zeal, that he would find no weakness in himself to militate against the execution of such orders. He was mistaken in himself, however. He had led the fierce mobs of Paris to acts of bloodshed and violence, but in doing so he had only assisted with an eager hand in the overthrow of those who he thought were tyrannizing over the people. He had stood by at the execution of a King, and ordered the drums to beat to drown the last words of the dying monarch; but the King had been condemned by those whom Santerre looked on as the wisest and best of the nation; and in acting as he had done, he had been carried on as well by ideas of duty as excitement. He found his present a much more difficult task. Indeed, after sitting still for some few minutes in that easy chair, meditating what he would do next, he found that the work which he had undertaken was one which he literally could not go through with.
“Is the old gentleman there?” said he; and as he asked, the Marquis, with his eyes closed, and his hands crossed on his breast, was wheeled into the room. Agatha was seated, or rather was crouching, on a sofa in the corner, for Adolphe Denot was standing over her uttering threats and words of love alternately, the latter of which, however, sounded by far the most horrible in poor Agatha’s ears.
“Give me a pen and paper,” said Santerre, and having got them, he continued writing for a minute or two. “Now, my old friend,” said he, addressing the Marquis, “I am given to understand that you yourself, personally, have never lent a hand to this iniquitous revolt. Is it so?”
“I am too old and too infirm to carry a sword,” said the Marquis, “but what little I could do for my King, I—.”
“Exactly—exactly,” said Santerre, interrupting him, “you are a cripple I see. There is no evidence wanting to show that you haven’t taken up arms. It is this pestilent son of yours has brought you into trouble.”
“He would have been no son of mine had he not acted as he has done,” said the old man indignantly.
“Will you hold your silly tongue, my friend,” said Santerre. “He is doting, quite doting, I see,” and he turned round to his brother officers, as though appealing to them to corroborate his opinion.
“Either that, or else he must be very fond of Mademoiselle Guillotine,” said one of them.
“Well, now, old gentleman, answer me this question,” said Santerre, “do you want to die this evening?”
“If I could but think that my daughter was safe, and out of the power of that viper, whom I have warmed in my bosom, death would not be unwelcome to me.”
“Viper!” said Denot, curling his lips, and speaking through his closed teeth. “Warmed in your bosom! I have yet to learn, old man, that I owe you ought; but if it be a comfort to you to know it, know that no worse evil awaits your daughter than to become the wife of a true Frenchman.”
“True!” said the Marquis. “Yes, as true as the Prince of Darkness.”
“Come, old man,” said Santerre, “we know nothing about Princes, nor yet about Marquises. You must be content now to call the devil by his plain name, though I rather believe it has already been decided in Paris, that the gentleman is nothing but a foul fiction of the aristocrats. Come, if you wish to save your neck, put your signature to this little document.”
“I will sign nothing that is put before me in such a manner,” said the Marquis.
“Why you have not even read it. Take the pen in your hand, I tell you; it is only a proclamation of the truth, that you have not taken up arms against the republic.”
Agatha understood the object of the republican General, though her father did not. She sprang from the corner in which Denot had placed her, and coming close to her father, whispered to him.
“The gentleman means well to you, father, though his words are rough. He wishes to save us. He will save both of us, father, if he can. Read the paper, and if there be nothing absolutely untrue in it, put your name to it.”
“Read it yourself, Agatha,” said he, “and if you then tell me to sign it, I will do so.”
Agatha took up the paper which Santerre had written, and read, but not aloud, the following words:
“I hereby proclaim myself a true son of the Republic, and a citizen brother of all free Frenchmen. I declare that I have never carried arms against the Convention myself, and demand that I may not be accounted responsible for any misguided members of my family, who may have done so.”
Twice Agatha read the words, and as she did so, her father’s eyes rested anxiously on her face. “Well, my child,” said he, “your father’s honour is in your hands; tell me what I am to do,” and he mechanically held the pen within his fingers, which Santerre had thrust into his hand.
“We will die, father,” said she, “if these men please it,” and she put down the document on the table on which it had been written. “I cannot ask you to denounce our dear, our gallant Henri. I cannot bid you to deny your King. Death at any rate will not dishonour us. We will only beg of this gentleman that in his mercy he will not separate us,” and putting her arm round her father’s neck, she fastened her hand upon the folds of his coat, as though determined that nothing should again separate her from his side.
“Denounce Henri!” said the old man; “denounce my own dear, gallant son, the most loyal of those who love their King—the bravest of the brave! No, Sir! I give you no thanks for your mercy, if you intended any. I, and my daughter, Sir, cannot bear arms for our King; she by reason of her sex, and I from my infirmities; but, Sir, we can die for him; we can die for him as readily as the bravest who falls in the first ranks of the battle. Had I still so much power in my own house as to command a cup of wine, I would drink my last pledge to my royal master—but it matters not; the heart and the will are still the same,” and taking off the tasselled velvet cap which he wore, he waved it above his head, exclaiming, “Vive le Roi! vive le Roi!”
“The accursed, pestilent old fanatic!” said Santerre, spurning the table as he rose in his passion, and upsetting it into the middle of the room; and then he walked up and down the salon with rapid strides, trying to induce himself to give orders for the immediate execution of the staunch old royalist.
“What is to be done next, General?” said one of his officers, who did not quite admire the evident clemency of the brewer.
“The accursed, pestilent old fanatic!” he repeated between his teeth; and then he said, after drawing a long breath: “they must go to Paris, and let Fouquier Tinville deal with them. There may be secrets that I know not of. I think it better that they should go to Paris.” And he felt relieved of a heavy load in having devised a scheme by which he could avoid having himself to give the order for the execution. “Let him be locked up, and well treated, mind you. He shall go to Saumur in his own carriage, and Barrère may send him to Paris how he pleases, or to the devil if he chooses.”
“And the servants, General?”
“Oh! ah, yes, the servants!” said Santerre, walking out into the hall to inspect them; “women, an’t they? What, five, six, seven, nine women, one old man, and a boy; well, I suppose we must have them out in a row, and shoot them.”
Down on their knees went the nine women and the boy, imploring that their innocent lives might be spared to them. Momont, like his master, had still some spirit in his bosom, and kept his seat, saying to himself, but out loud, “I told him so—I told him so. I told him that we who remained here needed as much courage as those who went to the wars; but now, he that talked so much, he’s the only one to run away.” The poor butler alluded to Chapeau, who had certainly been in the house a few minutes before the arrival of the republicans, and who as certainly had not been seen since.
“I suppose we must have them out before the house, and fire upon them?”
And he turned to the officer who was next to him, as though asking his advice.
“If you ask my advice, General, I would make no difference between the lot; ten minutes should see the last of the whole set of them—the old man, his daughter, and the rest. If we are to send every master of a family with his children up to Paris, or even to Saumur, the tribunals can never do their work, nor can the guillotines fall half fast enough for them.”
“When I ask your advice on one subject, Captain, I do not expect you to give it me on another,” said Santerre. “Sergeant, take those women out, and the old man, and the boy, stand them in a line upon the gravel plot there, and bring a file of musketeers.” And the republican General again began pacing up and down the room, as though he did not at all like the position in which his patriotic zeal had placed him.
The poor women were dragged by their limbs out before the door, screeching as they went, and filling the air with their loud, agonizing cries. Momont walked after them, with his head hanging down, his knees shaking, and his back bent double; but still he was walking himself; he was still able to save himself the disgrace of being dragged out like the women. When he got to the front door, he attempted to totter back, but a republican soldier stopped him.
“My master! my dear master!” said Momont, “let me but kiss his hand, and I will come back.”
The soldier let him pass in, and the old man in a moment was at his master’s feet. “God bless you, Monseigneur!” said he, “God bless you! Say one word of kindness to your servant, before he is shot for loving his master and his King.”
The Marquis put his hand on the grey hairs of the old butler, and moved his lips, but he said nothing: the power of speech for the time failed him; the energy he had displayed, and the excitement he had felt, had been too much for him, and he was unable to reply aloud to the blessing of his faithful servant.
“God bless you, Momont,” said Agatha, calmly, as she stood close to her father, still holding to his coat, and supporting his head against her body. “Let your last thoughts be of the Saviour who died for you, and so shall your death be only the end of all your troubles.”
He was not allowed to remain longer on his knees, but was hurried back to the spot where the women were awaiting their doom. The soldiers could not get them to stand; they were crouching down on the ground in all positions, one or two with their heads almost buried in the earth, one or two kneeling, and still screaming for mercy. The old housekeeper had fallen on her haunches, and was looking up to heaven, while she wildly struck the ground with her hands; the poor page had made a last, but futile effort to escape with the aid of his heels, but he had been at once caught, and was now bound by his waist to a tree, which grew close to the road on which the wretched party were huddled; the poor boy had quite forgotten his attempt at manhood and mingled his loud screams with those of the women.
“General,” said the sergeant, stepping up to him, “the men are ready; will you give the word to fire?”
Two salons, one looking to the front of the house, and the other to the back, communicated with each other by folding-doors, which were now wide open. Santerre, the Marquis, Denot, Agatha, and the other republican officer, were in the back room; the unfortunate wretches doomed to die were collected on the gravel before the windows of the front room; the carabineers who were to fire on them stood in a double file on the broad area before the front door, and above the steps. Santerre, on being addressed by the sergeant, stalked into the front room to give the order; his altered face plainly shewed the strong passion which was at work within his heart. As he passed from one room to the other, he threw his cap upon the ground, and trampled on it; then clenched his fist, and bit his lip till the blood ran. The fatal word “Fire” was on his tongue; but, without intending it, he looked through the window, and his eyes fell on the wretched creatures who were expecting death, and he was unable to give the command. He sank back upon a chair, and hiding his face in both his hands, he said to the sergeant, in a low voice:
“They must get some one else for this work, I am not the man I thought I was.” He then rose and said, in a voice he vainly attempted should appear calm and dignified, “Sergeant, keep the prisoners in custody this night: I have changed my mind. Be ready to march at four tomorrow morning. We will have a bonfire to light us on our journey: see that there are plenty of faggots ready before you let the men sleep.”
The poor women were unable to raise themselves and walk away, when they were made to understand that they were not to die that night. Some prayed, others screamed almost louder than before: one or two of them fainted, and continued fainting the greater part of the night: they were all of them taken into the house, and kept together in the kitchen surrounded by a guard.
“Citizen General!” said Denot to Santerre, stepping up to him after this scene was over; “I have performed my part of my engagement I believe.”
“Well, man, supposing you have; what do you want? Are you going to grumble because I have not slaughtered the wretches you have betrayed to me?”
“Not at all, General; you know your own duty, doubtless. I am going to return to Saumur, to which place I desire an escort for myself and this young lady.”
“By heaven I pity her!” said Santerre. “I don’t know what has come to me tonight, that I should trouble myself with the cares of a swarm of aristocrats.” And then he said, addressing Agatha, “Are you ready and willing, young woman, for a midnight ride with this hot young lover, who seems so fond of you?”
“She must be ready, General Santerre,” said Denot, taking hold of Agatha’s hand: “it is now my turn to command her: she must be ready, whether she be willing or no.”
“You will not force me to leave my father?” said Agatha, appealing to Santerre. “You will not deliver a poor unprotected girl into the hands of such a maniac as that.”
“Maniac!” said Denot. “But I care not; your words are to me like the empty wind: the time had gone by for words between you and me, when you refused to listen to those I addressed to you upon my knees. Come, Agatha, come; my heart’s treasure—for still you are so; come, my love, my captive, and my bride!” And Denot essayed to go, as though he expected Agatha to follow him through the world like a tame dog.
“Oh, Sir, protect me from him!” said Agatha, still appealing to Santerre. “He is mad—you see and hear he is mad! I have not asked you for my life, nor do I so now; but I pray you, I beseech you, by the remembrance of the females who are dear to yourself save me from the power of that frantic man. Had he not been mad, had he not utterly lost his senses, he would have been the last to have brought you hither.”
“I have thought something like that myself pretty one,” said Santerre. “Come, Denot, you shall talk to the lady tomorrow; we will leave her with her father tonight.” “Your word, General!” said Denot, assuming his furious look, “your plighted word and honour. Was she not to be my prize, my captive, my reward. You dare not go back from the promise you have made me.”
“Nonsense, man alive,” said Santerre. “You can’t carry her off tonight. I believe in my heart she’s right, and that you’re as mad a man as ever roared in a hospital. Let go her arm, I tell you; you shall not drag her about in that way.”
The Marquis, during this scene, was endeavouring to throw his arms round his daughter, so as to protect her; but his efforts were but of little avail. Agatha herself still held to her father by one hand, but the other she was unable to extricate from her persecutor’s grasp. She did not scream or cry, for there was something within her—a memory of Cathelineau’s last moments, of her brother’s gallantry, and her father’s loyalty, which strongly urged her to repress her tears before a republican; but her strength was almost gone, her nerves were all but over strung, when she heard a sudden noise behind her of some one rushing into the room, and Adolphe Denot quickly dropped her hand, and gave a yell of pain. He had received a sharp blow of a cherry switch across his face, and the blood was running from both his cheeks.
Santerre, and the other republican officers in the room, put their hands to their pistols, and prepared to defend themselves, but the only person who appeared was a young boy: to be sure he had the dreadful red scarf round his waist; but he had no weapon but his cherry stick, after having given Denot the blow across his face, he made no farther use of that. It was the little Chevalier who had arrived so opportunely; he took Agatha’s hand in his, and pressed it closely, and took his place beside her without speaking a word.
“And who the deuce is this young bantam cock?” said Santerre.
“I am the little Chevalier Mondyon,” said Arthur; “a true royalist, and sworn knight to Agatha Larochejaquelin. And that man there is a traitor and a false knave; he is not fit to be punished with a sword like a gentleman.”
“Well crowed, my bantam,” said Santerre; “and be good enough to tell me where you come from. No, friend Denot, no, we’ll have no dagger work just at present.” And putting his huge hand on the other’s shoulder, he dragged him back as he was about to plunge his knife into the little Chevalier.
“I came from the cherry wood there,” said Arthur. “Maybe you think I ought not to have run away, and deserted my lady love. Maybe I’m rather ashamed of my own self, but at any rate when you speak of it, say that I came back of my own accord. I’m not a bit afraid to die now,” and as he spoke he squeezed Agatha’s hand. His heart was full of apprehension, lest she should suspect for a moment that he had really fled from her through fear, but Agatha understood well his ready wit, and appreciated his more than boyish courage.
Santerre now made his arrangements for the night. All the inhabitants of the château were kept under strict surveillance. The Marquis, his daughter, and the Chevalier were allowed to remain together, and Denot was prevented from annoying them. At day-break the following morning Durbellière was to be burnt, and Santerre, with his prisoners, would then proceed to join Westerman at Bressuire.
“Let him slaughter them, if he likes,” said he to himself, “I don’t care what he says of me. I am at any rate too well known to be suspected. I don’t know what came over me today, but had the Republic depended on it, I could not have done it,” and he flung himself down on one of Agatha’s sofas, and slept not the less soundly for having began his career of extermination in so vacillating a manner.
CHAPTER X. — THE RESCUE.
The little Chevalier had no intention of saving himself, and deserting his friends, when, on Santerre’s approach, he ran off, leaving Agatha and the Marquis at the garden door of the château. He knew that Chapeau was at the smith’s forge, with his own pony. He had himself sent him there; and as soon as he perceived, on running round the side of the house, that the whole front was occupied by the blues, his first idea was to go after his pony, and ride as fast as the animal could carry him to Echanbroignes, and bring the royalists from thence to the rescue of their friends at Durbellière. With this object he clambered over the garden-wall, and well knowing every foot of the ground, reached the forge in a few minutes. Chapeau and the smith were there, as was also the pony, and a breathless countryman was already telling them that the château was surrounded by the whole army of blues.
“Here’s the Chevalier,” said Chapeau, stopping the peasant in his story. “In the name of Heaven, M. Arthur, what is all this?”
“That traitor, Denot, has brought a parcel of blues down upon the château,” said the Chevalier. “The Marquis and Mademoiselle Agatha are already in their hands; they will be murdered before morning. What is to be done? Oh! Chapeau, what are we to do to save them?”
“M. Denot!” said Chapeau. “You don’t mean to say M. Denot has turned blue—”
“I saw him with my own eyes,” said the boy; “he was one of the officers commanding the men; but there was another over him, a big, clumsy, noisy man; he it was I saw first of all, and Denot was behind him; and then there was a crowd of horsemen following them. Both drawing-rooms were full before we knew they were in the house at all.”
“And how did you get through them, M. Arthur?” said Chapeau.
“I got over the wall behind the stables. I never went into the house at all. But what on earth are we to do, Chapeau? Can’t we get the men from Echanbroignes to come to the rescue?”
The matter was then discussed between them, and it was decided that Chapeau should take the pony, and collect the men at Echanbroignes and on the road thither, and that he should return with them, if possible, during the night; that the smith should go off to St. Laud, and get Father Jerome to bring with him the men from thence, and that Arthur should return to the château.
“No,” said he, when Chapeau pressed him to undertake the mission to Echanbroignes, “I will not leave Mademoiselle Agatha and the Marquis any longer. They will think I have run away. Besides, maybe, I can be of some service to them there. At any rate, I will go and see what is going on; but, Chapeau, our lives depend on you. Don’t lose one single minute now, even though you should ride poor Bayard to death,” and he put his hand on the neck of the pony, whom he had named after the flower of chivalry.
Chapeau and the smith started on their important missions, and the Chevalier slowly, but manfully, walked back to the château. No one stopped him as he walked through the open gates, and in at the back door. On getting into the hall, he heard the sound of the Marquis’s voice, as he was praying Santerre to preserve his daughter from Denot, and then, hurrying into the room, he made use of the little cherry stick which he carried, in the manner which has been described.
None of the inhabitants of the château went to bed that night; indeed, the beds were all occupied by the troopers, who threw themselves down to sleep, without taking off their boots, wherever they could find any convenient place to lie down. To do Santerre justice, he repeatedly pressed the Marquis to go to his own room, assuring him that he should not be further disturbed than by the presence of a sentinel; but the old man insisted on remaining in the salon, and Agatha and the Chevalier sat with him. Santerre, and Denot, and a cavalry sergeant, remained in the same room, and a couple of sentinels were stationed on the top of the steps at the back of the house, and four at the front. None of the party in the salon slept, excepting Santerre; but they all sat silent; neither Arthur nor Agatha dared to speak to each other on the subject which at that time filled their thoughts. The night seemed dreadfully long to Arthur, and yet hardly long enough. He discovered soon after his return, that it was Santerre’s purpose to burn the château early in the morning, and then to take the inhabitants away with him as prisoners; and he greatly feared that Chapeau would not be able to return in time to prevent the conflagration. He anxiously watched the first break of day, and listened intently, but for a long time in vain, for the noise of coming feet. About half-past two, a soldier came and whispered to the sergeant, who then woke Santerre, and whispered to him, but the General was sleepy, and did not wish his dreams should be disturbed. He muttered something to the sergeant, who again left him, and resumed the seat in which he had sat since he first entered the room. Denot had risen two or three times during the night, and paced rapidly and uneasily about. Whenever he had done so, Agatha had firmly grasped both her father’s chair and the Chevalier’s hand, as though she feared he was about to renew his attempts to drag her away, but he did not either touch her or speak to her. He was probably aware that the sergeant, who sat there without once closing his eyes through the long hours, had orders to prevent him from doing so.
The Chevalier had no watch, and could not see how the hours were going, but it seemed to him as though it were broad day. He thought it must be five, six, nay seven o’clock; and he could not understand why the lazy republicans remained so passive and so quiet, nor could he imagine why Chapeau was so long in coming. The whole affair seemed to him so strange that he could hardly help fancying that he was dreaming. There sat close to him his dear friend Agatha, with her eyes wide open, fixed on Denot, and she had been gazing in this way for hours after hours, without speaking a word. There was the Marquis close to her, equally silent, but also wide awake, though his eyes were closed. Arthur was sure that he was awake. There was Denot marching to and fro. Adolphe Denot, who but the other day was in the house, not only as a friend, but as a comrade, eager in the cause in which they were all embarked, as much at home in the château as Henri Larochejaquelin himself: and now he was the worst of traitors, and the most cruel of enemies—there was the sergeant of the republican army, sitting as quiet and composed as though he were merely idling his time away in his own barracks; and there was Santerre—the much talked of republican brewer and General; the sanguinary, remorseless, fanatic democrat; the sworn enemy of all that was noble, loyal and gentle, the dreaded Santerre; for the Chevalier had now learned the name of the big, clumsy, noisy man, whom he had seen leading his troops into the salon where he was now sleeping—there he was, sleeping fast: while care, anxiety, or a sense of duty banished sleep from all the others, he, who had so much more need than others to be watchful, was snoring loud, and dreaming of the denizens of the faubourgs, who used to love him so well. All this seemed to Arthur like a dream from which he could not awake—there were his enemies, his deadly enemies, before and around him. He knew that it was the practice of the republican soldiers to massacre all whom they took bearing arms against the Republic he had even heard that it was now their horrid purpose to go further than this, and to slaughter the inhabitants of the whole district which had revolted; at any rate his own doom would be death; he was certain that he had not many days, probably many hours, to live, unless Chapeau should arrive in time, and with sufficient force, to rescue the whole party. Yet he felt no fear; he could not sufficiently realize the position in which he found himself, to feel the full effects of its danger. The republican sergeant sat immediately in front of him, and each kept his eye fixed on the other’s face; not that either of them had any object in doing so, any particular motive for watching the other’s countenance, but soon after day-break the gaze of each had become fixed, and it seemed as though neither of them were able to turn away his eyes.
Arthur occupied his mind in speculating on the character of the soldier, in trying to guess from his features whether he were a cruel or a kind-hearted man; whether he were a ferocious democrat, eager for the blood of all who had been born in a rank above him, or merely a well-trained soldier, obeying the behests of those under whose orders it was his duty to act. The Chevalier had no idea that his own or his friends’ fate depended in any way on the man’s disposition; but such thoughts came across his brain unwittingly, and he could not restrain them. At last, he felt that he had a kind of intimacy with the sergeant; that if he should chance to meet him after three or four years had passed, he should greet him as an old acquaintance, whom he had well known, and he was sure that the sergeant had the same feeling respecting him.
The day dawned soon after two o’clock, and as by degrees the clear sun-light streamed in at the uncurtained windows, Arthur, in his impatience, thought that the day was advancing; but in reality it was not yet five o’clock, when Santerre, waking with a tremendous yawn, stretched his huge limbs, and then jumped up from the sofa on which he had been lying.
“Now for a bonfire,” said he, “and then for breakfast; or perhaps we had better get our breakfast first, and have our bonfire afterwards. Old gentleman, I have no doubt my men took strange liberties with your cellar and larder last night. I hope they have left enough about the place to furnish you with the last meal you will ever eat in this château.”
“I know, Sir, what soldiers are in a house,” said the old man. “I will not say that your men are welcome here, for that would be falsehood; but I begrudge them nothing that they eat and drink.”
“Well, that’s kind of you; but, considering that all which is not now eaten and drunk, will be immediately wasted and spoilt, you would certainly be foolish to allow the consumption of your provisions to make you uneasy. Here, sergeant,” and then Santerre spoke aside to the sergeant, and gave him various orders, which the man departed to obey.
“And now, General Santerre,” said Denot, marching close up to him, “are you prepared to make good your promise to me? Are you prepared to give me an escort for myself and this lady, and to allow us to commence our journey from hence to Saumur?”
Denot’s personal appearance had not been at all improved by the blow which Arthur had given him across his face. Both his cheeks were much swollen immediately beneath the eyes, and one of them was severely cut. He felt that his looks were against him, and he endeavoured to make up for the injury his countenance had sustained by the sternness of his voice, and the determined rigour of his eye. “I presume, General Santerre,” added he, “that your plighted word is sufficient warrant to me for your good faith.”
“There is the lady,” said Santerre, pointing to Agatha. “I did not undertake to protect you from the wrath of any rivals you might have in her affections. It seems to me that at present she prefers that young dare-devil slip of aristocracy to your patriotic ardour. If she won’t go to Saumur with you, I can’t make her.”
“By all the powers of heaven and hell, she shall go with me!” said Denot, advancing towards her.
“Beware the switch—beware the switch again, thou false knave!” said the little Chevalier, jumping up, and standing immediately before Agatha, with his cherry stick in his hand. Denot had no other arms about him but his dagger, and that he drew, as he advanced towards the boy.
“No daggers—I will have no daggers,” shouted Santerre. “Sergeant, take the dagger from him, unless he puts it up.”
“Beware the switch, thou traitor! beware the switch, thou knave!” continued the Chevalier, shaking the stick at Denot, upon whose arm the strong hand of the sergeant, who had returned to the room, was now laid heavily.
“I will choke the brat as I would an adder,” said Denot, attempting to shake off the sergeant’s hand. “There, take the dagger,” and he dropped it on the ground, and rushing at the boy, got inside the swing of his stick, and made a grasp at his throat. Arthur, however, was too quick for him, and pushing away his hand, fastened his own arms round his adversary. They were now close locked in each other’s embrace, and kicking, plunging, and striving, each did his best to throw the other to the ground.
“Oh! Sir, kind Sir, for mercy’s sake separate them!” said Agatha, appealing to Santerre; “he is but a boy, a child, and that wretched man is mad. He’ll murder the boy before your eyes, if you do not separate them.”
“He won’t find it so easy though,” said the Chevalier, panting, and out of breath; but still holding his own, and, indeed, more than his own; for he had fixed his left hand in Denot’s hair, and was pulling his head backwards with such force, that he nearly broke his neck.
“I think the young one has the best of it,” said Santerre; “but come, citizen Denot, your loves and your quarrels are troublesome to us; we have other work to attend to. Get up, man, get up, I tell you.”
Denot, by his superior weight and strength, had succeeded in getting the Chevalier to the ground, but Arthur still kept his hold in his hair, and though Adolphe was on the top of his foe, he did not find it very easy to get up.
“Get up, I say,” said Santerre. “You’ll gain nothing by wrestling with that fellow; he’s more than a match for you. Well, Captain, what’s the matter?”
The room in which the party had passed the night looked out into the garden at the back of the house. The front room communicated with this by folding-doors, which during the night had been closed. These doors were now violently thrown open, and one of the officers, followed by about a dozen men, rushed into the room.
“The road is crowded with men,” said the officer; “thousands of these brigands are on us. The château will be surrounded in five minutes.”
“H—— and the d——,” said Santerre between his teeth. “This comes of playing the fool here,” and he hurried out of the room in company with the officer.
“Hurrah!” said the Chevalier, jumping to his feet. “I knew they’d be here soon—I knew they’d be here soon,” and running to Agatha’s side he caught hold of her hand, and covered it with kisses.
Denot also arose. He had also heard the officer say that the peasants were coming on them, and he felt that if he were taken, he could expect no mercy from those who had so lately been his friends. He did not, however, attempt to fly, but he stood still on the spot where he got up, and after wiping his hot brow with his handkerchief, he said slowly and mournfully—“Agatha Larochejaquelin, you now see to what your conduct has reduced me; and with my last breath I tell you that I owe my disgrace, my misery, and my death—ay, and the loss of my eternal soul, to you, and to you only. Ay, shudder and shake, thou lovely monster of cruelty. Shake and grieve with remorse and fear. You may well do so. My living form shall trouble you no more, but dead and dying I will be with you till the last trump sounds on the fearful day of judgment.”
Agatha did not answer him. She felt assured that he was mad, and she only pitied him. She had now too reason to hope that she and her father, and their whole household, would be relieved from their horrible position, and she no longer felt anything like anger against the unfortunate wretch whom uncontrolled passions had absolutely maddened. Arthur, in his anxiety to see what was going forward, was about to leave the room, but Agatha laid her hand upon his arm to detain him, merely looking towards Denot as she did so.
“And do you think,” said Denot, “that puny boy could really stop my way, if I chose to put out my right hand against him. Boy, I despise and disregard you! would before I die that it might be allowed me to measure arms with any man, who would dare to say that he would advocate your cause!”
“Beware the switch, traitor—beware the switch!” repeated the Chevalier.
“Be quiet, Arthur, do not anger him,” whispered Agatha. “It is not generous, you know, to insult a fallen foe.”
“There are no terms to be kept with a traitor, Agatha. If we get the better of this, Santerre, as I am sure we shall now, you shall see that I know how to treat a generous foe generously.”
When Santerre reached the front of the house, he at once saw that any attempt on his part to oppose the crowd of armed peasants who were now close upon him, would be futile. The only mode of escape which appeared to him at all practicable, was to attempt to ride through them. He gave the command “to horse,” and got so far himself as to mount into his saddle; but it was of no use, he was surrounded by a crowd of peasants before he got to the gate, and he soon found himself on foot again, and unarmed. Some ten or twenty of his men, who were ready to jump into the saddle at the moment when they were first aware of the approach of the royalists, escaped, but the remainder in a few minutes found themselves prisoners in the château.
The peasants were headed by Father Jerome, the priest of St. Laud, and it was he who first mounted the steps leading up to the front door of the house. “Thank God,” said he, speaking more to himself than to those around him. “Thank God!” and he stood up against the pedestal of one of the lions, the heavy wooden crucifix which he had carried in his hand as he marched, or rather ran, to the succour of his friends at Durbellière; and then he took off his cap, and with the sleeve of his dusty grey coat he wiped the perspiration from off his brow. “And the Marquis and Mademoiselle are unhurt? Thank God—thank God! we were just in time, but we had a smart run for it.”
Chapeau had already dived into the kitchen through the window, and had learnt that at any rate the republicans had as yet shed no blood.
“And how did the Marquis bear it, Momont?” said he. “It was enough to kill the old gentleman.”
“‘Why, yes,” said Momont. “We had to bear a good deal, but we did bear it manfully and well. We were all led out to be shot, you know.”
“What, the Marquis and Mademoiselle and all?” said Chapeau.
“No, not the Marquis and Mademoiselle; they were to be beheaded after us, but the rest of us were all taken out—the muskets loaded—the men to shoot us all in a line.”
“Oh! Chapeau, it was so awfully dreadful,” said the cook. “If I live a thousand years I shall never get over this night.”
“Oh, yes! most dreadfully awful,” said the laundress. “I was carried in from the spot, and have not been able to move a limb since. I doubt I never shall put a foot to the ground again.”
“The muskets were to their shoulders,” continued Momont. “We heard them cocked: each man took deliberate aim; the women here were screeching and screaming.”
“Of course we were,” said the confidential maid. “Hadn’t we good cause to scream, waiting to be killed every minute. I’m sure I wonder I ever came to my senses again. I declare when they came to pick me up, I thought it was all over, and that I’d been shot already.”
“Well, I don’t think anybody heard me scream,” said Momont: “but there’s a difference I know between a man and a woman. ‘It’s all for my King and my master,’ said I to myself. Besides a man can die but once, and it’s a great thing to die honourably.” The old man turned round to receive the approbation, which he considered was due to the sentiment he had expressed, and found that Chapeau was gone. The kitchen, however, was filled with peasants, and in them Momont found ready listeners and warm admirers.
Both Chapeau and the priest had spent the greater portion of the night in collecting what they considered would be a sufficient number of men to enable them to attack, with any chance of success, the republican soldiers who had taken possession of Durbellière. They had neither of them the slightest idea what amount of force had been brought against the château, and, consequently, wasted much time in procuring many more men than were necessary for the purpose. The three hundred, who were immediately got together on the sounding of the tocsin in the village of Echanbroignes, would have been sufficient to have done the work without further assistance, for they were all well armed, and, by this time, tolerably well trained in the use of their arms.
There was ten times more confusion now in the château, than there had been during the night: every room and passage was crowded with peasants, who took up their positions there under the plea of guarding their prisoners, and with the girls and women of the neighbourhood who flocked to that place, as soon as they heard that the horrible blues were all prisoners, and that the Marquis and Mademoiselle were once more at liberty. Agatha’s troubles were by no means ended. Provisions of some kind were to be procured for the friends who had come so far and done so much to relieve them; and she had no one on whom she could depend to assist her in procuring them: the servants all considered themselves utterly unfitted for anything, except talking of the events of the evening; and though every one was burning with affection and zeal for Monseigneur and Mademoiselle, no one appeared willing to make himself useful.
The reaction on his feelings was too much for the poor Marquis. During the long evening and night, in which he had been a prisoner and looking forward to nothing but death; in which he had sat beside his fondly-loved daughter, whose fate he feared would be so much more horrible than death itself, he had patiently and manfully born his sufferings; he had even displayed a spirit for which few gave him credit, who were accustomed to his gentle temper and mild manners; but the unexpected recovery of his own and his daughter’s liberty upset him entirely. As soon as he had pressed Father Jerome’s hand, and thanked Chapeau fur what he had done, he begged that he might be carried off to his bed, and left there quietly till the return of his son, for whom, he was told, a messenger had been sent.
Santerre and Denot were both kept under a strong guard in the saloon in which they had passed the night; and there the priest, Chapeau, and the young Chevalier passed the greater part of the day, anxiously waiting the arrival of Henri Larochejaquelin.
“I never liked that man,” said the priest, whispering to Arthur and Chapeau, for the latter, from his exertion and zeal was looked upon rather as an officer in the royalist army, than as a servant. “I never liked Adolphe Denot, but I could never say why. The tone of his voice was disagreeable to me, and the expression of his features aroused in me both dislike and distrust. It is not long since M. Henri rebuked me for being hard on him, and judging him harshly; and I was angry with myself for having done so. I knew, however, there was something wrong within him. He has turned out to be as base a creature as ever trod the earth.”
“It will be a desperate blow to M. Henri,” said Chapeau, “for he loved him as though he were his brother.”
“I will be his brother now,” said Arthur; “he shall love me in his place.”
“Ah! M. Arthur,” said Chapeau, “his heart is large enough to love us both; but when he hears how nobly you behaved last night, how you stood by Mademoiselle Agatha, and protected her, you will be his real brother indeed.”
The little Chevalier’s heart rose high within him, as he attempted to speak slightingly of his own services. “Oh!” said he, “I couldn’t do much, you know, for I had only a stick; but of course we red scarfs will always stick to each other. Denot, you know, never was a red scarf Well, thank heaven for that; but I tell you what, Father Jerome, that Santerre is not such a bad fellow; and so I shall tell Henri; he is not a bad fellow at all, and he scorns Denot as he deserves to be scorned.”