CHAPTER IV.
A SCENT OF DANGER.
I bore the blow with such stoicism as I possessed, and even made some show of listening and laughing at M. le Comte’s account of our meeting and subsequent reconciliation. Both women were unaffectedly delighted with the story, which, indeed, was told with a wit and spirit quite beyond my reproduction. As I write these lines I am again impressed with the wide difference between the awkward country boy who sat scowling in that pleasant company and the accomplished and finished gentleman who did so much to entertain it. For I know now that my assumption of ease and interest could have deceived no one. All of us, I think, looking back over the mistakes and gaucheries of our youth must feel our cheeks crimson more than once; certainly mine grow red when I think upon the sorry figure I made that evening. But when I started to set this history upon paper I determined not to spare myself, nor will I.
“But who could have sent the message?” asked madame when M. le Comte had finished the story.
“I cannot even guess,” he answered.
“How was it delivered to you? How came you to believe it?”
“I believed it,” he explained, “because it was brought to me by one of our old servants—Laroche—whom I left in charge of the stables.”
“Ah, true,” murmured madame. “Laroche disappeared a week ago. I fancied he had run away to join the Revolutionists.”
“Perhaps he did,” said her husband quietly.
Madame looked at him with a start of alarm.
“The Revolutionists?” she repeated. “It was they who sent the message? But why? What was their object? Ah, I know,” she added with sudden conviction. “It was to deprive the Vendéans of your sword, in order that they might be defeated.”
M. le Comte smiled as he looked down into her fond, admiring eyes.
“Ah, my dear,” he said, “my sword is not so powerful as that. The Vendéans will win their battles just the same without me. I think the message was merely the bait for a trap——”
“From which you have escaped!” she cried triumphantly, and clapped her hands.
“Yes,” he agreed; but there was still in his face a certain anxiety which she perceived.
“What is it, Henri?” she demanded. “You are not now in danger?”
He threw off his preoccupation with a laugh of genuine amusement.
“In danger?” he repeated. “No—or at least the only danger to which I am exposed at this moment, madame, is that of falling in love with you more violently than ever.”
“For shame, sir!” she cried, blushing like a girl. “You forget that we are not alone.”
“On the contrary,” he retorted, “I think our example a most excellent one for our young friends yonder;” and he looked across at us with beaming face, and with a meaning in his eyes which I tried in vain to fathom. “I hope they will profit by it.”
“Monsieur! Monsieur!” protested madame, restraining him, yet unable to preserve a stern countenance.
“Besides,” he added, laughing more and more, “it delights me to confuse that pert young lady sitting opposite us yonder—to make her blush, as she is doing at this moment,—and I swear, so is Tavernay! What a pair of children! If their parents had only had the good judgment to betroth them——”
“Monsieur!” interrupted madame, more sharply. “You will not break your promise. There was to be no word——”
“And I will say none; pardon me,” broke in M. le Comte. “The temptation was very great; and I hate to see a fellow-man barred out from Paradise;” and he looked at me, still laughing.
But I bent above my plate, all pleasure in the meal struck from me, for suddenly I found myself groaning beneath my burden. Barred out from Paradise—how apt the words were!—and with bars that could never be removed. Ah, yes, if our parents——
“What is it, monsieur?” asked a low voice at my side, and I raised my eyes to find myself gazing into the depths of those I loved. “You sighed,” she added, seeing that I did not understand.
“Did I?” I said, wondering somewhat that she remained so unruffled by the fire of raillery which had been turned upon her. “One is apt to sigh when there is something one desires very much and yet may not possess.”
“Perhaps I can help you,” she suggested, and I saw again in her eyes that light which should have set me on my guard. “If it is my smelling-bottle——”
“No, thank you,” I answered, with dignity. “I do not need it.”
“So you refuse to confide in me, even when I offer you my aid?”
“I fear you cannot aid me, mademoiselle; and if any one in the world could, it would be you.”
“I am not fond of riddles, M. de Tavernay; and it seems to me that you have just propounded one.”
“I spoke very seriously,” I said, “and as plainly as I could.”
“Oh, you mean it is my wits which are deficient! I must say, monsieur——”
“I meant nothing of the sort,” I protested. “I meant——”
“No matter,” she broke in. “Nothing is so wearisome as to have to explain one’s meaning—unless it be to listen to the explanation. I am sure it argues dulness somewhere.”
“I am sorry that I bore you,” I retorted, stung to a sort of desperation. “I had hoped that I might at least continue to furnish you amusement.”
“Really,” she cried, casting me a brilliant glance, “not a bad riposte. Come, we are quits, then?”
“With all my heart,” I agreed; “especially since you have removed your button.”
“Well, finish it,” she cried, her eyes dancing. “Finish it.”
“While I am too gallant to follow your example,” I added, relentlessly.
“Good!” she applauded. “Touché! I assure you, monsieur, you are not boring me in the least. All you need is a little practise, a little more assurance—you hesitate, as all beginners do, to drive the point home——”
“I am not bloodthirsty,” I interrupted. “On the contrary, I am of a disposition the most amiable.”
“And there is still about you a slight clumsiness,” she went on, not heeding me, “a lack of style and finish.”
“Remember, I have never been to Paris,” I reminded her, “nor even to Orléans.”
“I shall not remember it long, for there will soon be nothing about you to suggest it.”
I bowed my thanks.
“Especially if I may remain near you,” I said.
“Oh that—of course!” she agreed. “Well, you have my permission, and you will find M. le Comte most hospitable; so remain, unless this mysterious business of yours is imperative.”
“It is,” I said, my face clouding again. “I must set out at daybreak.”
“Ungallant man!” she retorted, looking at me with sparkling eyes. “Do you ask a favor only to refuse it? Do you understand what you are saying?”
“Only too well, mademoiselle,” I murmured desolately; “and I would rather have cut off my right hand than utter those words.”
“Still the riddle!” she cried, with a gesture of despair. “Really, monsieur, you weary me. Whatever it is you desire, I advise you to ask for it. One gets nothing in this world without asking—and if it is refused, taking it just the same.”
“But when one may neither ask nor take, mademoiselle?”
“Oh, then,” she retorted, with a shrug of the shoulders, “one is certainly in a bad way. One would better stop desiring;” and she turned her shoulder to me in the most impudent manner possible and gave her attention to M. le Comte.
“It is La Vendée which will re-establish monarchy in France,” he was saying, his face alight. “Those peasants are unconquerable. There are two hundred thousand of them, peaceful men, tilling the soil, tending their herds, as they had always done, with no thought of resisting the Republic until the Republic attempted to take from them their priests and to draft them forth to fight on the frontiers. Then they rose as one man, fell upon their oppressors, routed them, cut them to pieces among the hedges. Now they are back in their homes again to make their Easter; that over, they will march against Thouars and Saumur.”
“But, M. le Comte,” I protested, forgetting for a moment my own troubles in the interest of the narrative, “fighting of that sort can be successful only near home and in a most favorable country. For a campaign troops must have organization.”
“That is true, my friend,” he agreed. “Well, these troops are being organized. Once the Bocage is free of the Blues, which will be within the month, our army will be ready to cross the Loire, take Nantes, advance through Brittany, Normandy, and Maine, where we shall be well received, and at last march at the head of a united north-west against Paris itself! I tell you, Tavernay, the Republic is doomed!”
His eyes were sparkling, his face flushed with excitement. An electric shock seemed to run around the board, and madame sprang to her feet, glass in hand.
“The King!” she cried, and as we rose to drink the toast I had a vision of a boy of twelve issuing triumphantly from the gate of the Temple to avenge his murdered father.
“And may God protect him!” added M. le Comte, as we set our glasses down.
There was gloom for a moment in our hearts, and I at least felt the stark horror of the Revolution as I had never done. I saw more clearly its blood-guiltiness, its red madness. For in our quiet home at Beaufort the delirium of Paris had seemed far away, almost of another age and country.
We had shuddered at the stories of the September massacres, but only as one shudders at any tale of horror; even yet we scarcely believed that the King was really dead. It seemed impossible that such things could happen. Just as the body pushed beyond a certain limit of pain grows numb and suffers no more, so the mind after a certain time refuses to be impressed. It was thus with the reports which came from Paris, as one followed another, each more terrible than the last. Not even the actors in that hideous drama comprehended what was passing there; they were but chips in a maelstrom, hurled hither and thither, utterly powerless to stay or to direct the flood which hurried them on and finally sucked them down.
We of Beaufort were far off the beaten track, and of too little consequence to cause the tide of revolution to sweep in our direction; so it had passed us by at such a distance that we had caught only the faint, confused murmur of it. True, our peasants had for the most part deserted us; our fields were untilled, our flocks untended. There was no money in the till and little meat in the larder. But personally we had experienced no danger, and expected none. We had been content to sit quietly by while France wrought out her destiny, pitying those less fortunate than ourselves, and happy in the safety which our obscurity won for us.
Now I was suddenly brought face to face with the question, What was my duty? Was it to stay at home and permit these scoundrels to have their way unquestioned? Was it not rather to join the army of La Vendée and add my atom to its strength, to do what in me lay to render that campaign against the cannibals at Paris not a dream but a reality? For at last I understood. Those hideous tales were true. The fair land of France lay at the mercy of the vilest of her people——
“Still pondering the riddle?” asked my companion; and I turned to find her again regarding me with a provoking scrutiny.
“No, mademoiselle,” I said. “I was thinking that when M. le Comte rides back to the Bocage I will accompany him.”
Her eyes flashed a swift approval.
“That is a man’s place!” she said. “That is where I would be, were I a man!”
“You will wish me God-speed, then?” I questioned.
“Yes—provided, of course,” she added, looking at me searchingly, “that you are free to go.”
“Free to go!” I repeated, and my chin fell on my breast. What instinct was it gave her this power to stab home whenever she chose?
“Then you are not free to go?” she queried, eyeing me still more closely.
“I confess,” I stammered, “that it was not to don a white cockade I left Beaufort.”
“But surely any mere personal matter of business may be put aside when one’s country calls!”
“Alas!” I murmured, “this is not an affair of that nature.”
“Well,” she said coolly, “you must of course decide for yourself, monsieur; more especially since you seem to wish to shroud yourself in a veil of mystery.”
“Mademoiselle,” I said desperately, “I should like your advice.”
“But I understand nothing of the matter.”
“You shall understand, if you will do me the honor to hear me.”
“Would not M. le Comte’s advice be of more service?” she asked with a sudden trepidation which surprised me.
“No,” I said, decidedly, “not in this instance. I hope you will not refuse me.”
She glanced at my anxious face and smiled curiously.
“Very well,” she assented. “Proceed, then.”
“O, not here!” I protested, with a glance at the others. “Perhaps after dinner, mademoiselle, you will walk with me in the garden.”
“In the garden?” she repeated, in an astonished tone, and looked at me with lifted brows.
“I know that it is a great favor I am asking,” I continued hastily.
“Yes, it is more than that,” she broke in sharply. “It is not convenable. What strange customs you must have at Beaufort, monsieur! Are the young ladies there accustomed to grant such requests?”
“I do not know,” I answered miserably. “I have never before preferred such a one. I am not familiar with etiquette—with the nice rules of conduct. If I have done wrong, forgive me.”
I saw her glance at me quickly from the corner of her eye, and my heart grew bolder.
“It is a beautiful garden,” I went on. “I saw it this evening from my window. There are paths, seats——”
“I am familiar with the garden, monsieur,” she interposed dryly.
“And the moon will be full to-night,” I concluded.
“The more reason I should refuse you,” she retorted. “It will be a dangerous place. Though I am amply able to take care of myself,” she added.
“I do not doubt it, mademoiselle,” I agreed humbly, “especially with me. That has already been proved, has it not?”
“Yes,” she said, with a queer little smile; “yes, I think it has.”
“Believe me, it is not a ruse,” I added earnestly, “even were I capable of a ruse, which I am not. God knows I should like to walk with you there, but not to tell you what I shall to-night have to tell you.”
She looked at me again with a strange mixture of timidity and daring.
“Very well, M. de Tavernay,” she said at last. “In the garden then—provided, of course, that madame consents.”
“Thank you,” I said, my heart warm with gratitude. “Shall I ask her?”
“No; I will attend to that;” and she smiled a little as she glanced across the board. “But I know that it is not discreet; I am falling a victim to my curiosity. You have piqued it most successfully. Although I can never solve a riddle for myself, I cannot rest until I know the solution. I hope your riddle will be worth the risk.”
“It will,” I assured her; and fell silent, nerving myself for the task which lay before me.
“But will you hear what this tyrant is saying?” cried madame—“that I must leave the château to dwell amid the fogs of England——”
“Or beneath the blue skies of Italy,” said M. le Comte. “Really, madame, I fear the château is no longer safe for you. The Revolution is looking this way—and not with friendly eyes.”
“Does the Revolution, then, make war on women?”
“Have you forgotten Mlle. de Lamballe?”
Madame went white at the retort, almost brutal in its brevity.
“But that was the canaille of Paris,” she protested. “There are no such monsters here in Poitou.”
“Ah, my dear,” said her husband, sadly, “I fear there are monsters of the same sort wherever there are suffering and degraded men and women. And since it is us they blame for their suffering and degradation, it is upon us they try to avenge themselves. Besides, since the Republicans are trying to entrap me, they will doubtless end by coming here; and not finding me, they may throw you into prison as the surest way of causing me to suffer.”
“We have the tower!” cried madame. “We will defend ourselves!”
“The tower was not built to withstand artillery,” her husband pointed out; “and even if the Republicans have no cannon they need only camp about it and bide their time to starve you into surrender, since you could expect no aid from any quarter.”
“But to leave the château—to abandon it to pillage—oh, I could never endure it!”
“Better that than to lose it and our lives together. Yes, decidedly, you must set out to-morrow——”
“To-morrow!” echoed madame, in despairing tones.
“M. de Tavernay will accompany you as far as Poitiers. At Poitiers, Mlle. de Chambray——”
“Charlotte goes with me to Italy, do you not, my dear? It was arranged, you know, that you should remain with me.”
“I do not know, madame,” Charlotte stammered, turning very red. “I—I think perhaps I would better stop at Chambray.”
For some reason which I could not fathom both monsieur and madame burst into a peal of laughter, while my companion turned an even deeper crimson.
“As you will,” said her hostess when she had taken breath. “I myself think that you might do worse, happy as I would be to have you with me.”
“Why cannot you stop at Chambray also, madame?” questioned Charlotte, her face slowly regaining its normal hue. “At least until you find some friend also bound for Italy? You will be quite safe at Chambray.”
M. le Comte nodded.
“She is right, my dear,” he said. “Accept, and thank her. No one will look for you there—besides, it is not for you they are searching, but for me.”
“And where will you be, monsieur?”
“I shall be in the Bocage,” he answered simply, “fighting the enemies of France.”
Madame bit her lips to restrain their trembling, as she cast upon him a glance full of love and pride.
“That is where I would be also,” she said, “if the choice were mine. Madame de la Rochejaquelein accompanies her husband.”
“That is true,” he assented, “and she is sometimes frightfully in the way. If you knew that country, my love, you would see how impossible it is for women. Besides, I am not Rochejaquelein—I am not a leader, but a follower. I must go where I am ordered, and at once, without question. I shall fight better—I shall be worth more—knowing that you are in safety.”
“Very well, monsieur,” she said, her eyes shining. “As you will. You know best.”
He seized her hand and kissed it.
“We shall have many happy days together,” he said, “when the fight is won.”
And as I looked at them I fancied that happy future already realized.
“You perceive, M. de Tavernay,” he smiled, catching my eyes, “that though I have the honor to be this lady’s husband, I have never ceased to be her lover.”
“Indeed, that is not wonderful, M. le Comte,” I said, with a glance at the adoring face beside him. “Anything else is inconceivable.”
“Thank you, monsieur!” cried madame. “You have the tongue of a courtier.”
“I assure you, madame,” I protested, “that came from the heart.”
She laughed as she rose to her feet, and held out her hand to me with a quick little pressure of the fingers.
“Do not be long,” she said. “We women will be lonely.”
I held back the drapery at the door for her and watched her as she passed—the beautiful, fair head, set imperiously upon the slender neck; the little ear, pink-tinted; the rounded, perfect arm——
Then another vision passed and eclipsed the first one, though all I caught of it was a glance from a pair of eyes dancing with mischief.
“M. de Tavernay,” said my host, coming up behind me and placing his hand affectionately upon my shoulder, “I confess to you that I do not wish to sit nodding here over the wine. I had not seen my wife for near a month, until a few hours ago; after to-morrow it may be that I shall never see her again. I know you will pardon me when I say that I cannot bear the thought of spending one moment of this night away from her.”
“I beg of you to say no more,” I protested. “I too wish to join the ladies.”
“I knew it!” he laughed; then his face sobered as he looked at me. “Come, my friend, I am going to speak to you frankly. It is a wonderful chance which brought you here to meet Charlotte; I cannot tell you how wonderful—you will learn for yourself some day. Make the most of it. She is a woman worth winning—but you have seen that. What perhaps you have not seen—since there are no eyes so blind as a lover’s—is that she may be won.”
I caught a deep breath—a breath as much of agony as of joy.
“You think so?” I murmured. “You think so?”
“I am sure of it!” he said, and wrung my hand. “Good luck to you! Remember,” he added laughing, “a fortress of that sort is never to be taken by siege—it must be carried by assault!” and he led the way into the drawing-room.