Monsieur Joseph glanced up at the Crucifix hanging over his bed, and, presently, seeing a glimmer of dawn through the shutters, knelt down and said his morning prayers.
He had scarcely finished when all the dogs began to bark, and there was a frightful growling and snarling outside his window. He opened it, and pushed back the shutters. The woods were grey and misty in a pale, unearthly dawn, and the house threw a shadow from the waning moon, which had risen behind the buildings and trees to the east. The howling wind of the night had gone down; the air was cold and still.
Monsieur Joseph saw a man with his head tied up, armed with a police carbine, making a short cut over the gra.s.s from the western wood. It was this man, Simon, whom the dogs were welcoming after their manner.
Monsieur Joseph"s voice silenced them. He stepped out, unarmed as he was, and met Simon in the sandy square.
"Ah no, no, my friend!" he said. "Your tricks are over, your work is done."
"Pardon, monsieur!" said Simon, respectfully enough.
"Do you understand me? Come, now, what authority had you for arresting my nephew? You are going to find it was a serious mistake. Be off with you, and let him alone in the future."
"I know all about that, monsieur," Simon answered coolly. "Your nephew is lucky enough to have a loyal father, who can pull him out of his sc.r.a.pes. Your nephew has plenty of friends--but even his connections won"t save him, I think, if he is mixed up in this new plot of yours. I must search your house at once, if you please."
"What do you mean, you scoundrel? You will not search my house," said Monsieur Joseph, fiercely.
"By order, monsieur."
"Whose order? The Prefect"s? Show it me."
"Pardon! There has not been time to apply to Monsieur le Prefet. We have intelligence of a plot, hatched here in your house, a plan for a rising.
We know that certain gentlemen are starting this very morning on a mission to England, to bring back arms and men. They will be caught--are caught already, no doubt--at their rendezvous. There was not time to go to Sonnay for orders and warrants; we had to strike while the iron was hot. We applied to General Ratoneau, who was at the ball at Lancilly. He not only gave us authority to search your house for arms and conspirators--he accompanied us himself. He is there, beyond the wood, with enough men to enter your house by force, if you refuse to let us enter peaceably."
For a moment Monsieur Joseph said nothing. Simon grinned as well as his stiff and aching head would let him, as he watched the little gentleman"s expressive face.
"We have got them, Monsieur le General!" he said to himself. He added aloud and insolently: "An unpleasant experience for the young gentleman, so soon after his wedding, but a final warning, I imagine. If he comes free and happy out of this, he will have done with Chouannerie!"
"Silence!" said Monsieur Joseph. "If you want conspirators, there is one here, and that is myself. I will go to Sonnay with you--though your accusations are ridiculous, and there is no plan for a rising. But I will not allow you to search my house, if there were ten generals and an army behind the wood there. I will shoot down any one who attempts it."
"So much the worse for you, monsieur," said Simon.
"Go back to General Ratoneau and tell him what I say," said Monsieur Joseph. "He will not doubt my word. Wait. I will speak to him myself.
Tell him I will meet him in ten minutes under the old oaks up there. I wish for a private word with him."
"Ten minutes, monsieur,"--Simon hesitated.
"Do as you are told," said Monsieur Joseph; and he stepped back into his room, pulled the shutters sharply to, and shut the window.
Simon lingered a minute or two, looking round the house, giving the growling dogs a wide berth, then went back with his message to the wood, and took the precaution of sending a man to watch the lanes on the other side. He did not, of course, for a moment suppose that there was any one there, except, most probably, Ange de la Mariniere and his bride; but it would not do to let him once again escape the General. What his plans might be, Simon only half guessed; but he knew they were desperate, and he knew that the man who balked him would repent it. And besides all this, he had not yet received a sou for all the dirty work he had lately done. But in the bitter depths of his discontented mind, Simon began to suspect that he had made a mistake in committing himself, body and soul, to General Ratoneau.
Monsieur Joseph took a small pistol from a cabinet, loaded it, then ran lightly upstairs and called Riette, who came flying to meet him. He took her in his arms and kissed her s.h.a.ggy pate.
"Your hair wants brushing, mademoiselle," he said. "You are a contrast to your beautiful cousin."
"Oh, papa, isn"t it glorious to think that Helene has married Angelot?
They do love each other so. She has been telling me that if only he were back safe from the etang des Morts, she would be the very happiest woman in the world."
"I hope she will be, and soon," said Monsieur Joseph. But he trembled as he spoke, for if Simon was right, Angelot and Cesar might be even now in the hands of the police.
"Listen, Riette," he said. "There are some men outside, police and officials--General Ratoneau is with them. Once again there are fancies in these people"s heads about me and my friends. They want to search the house. There is no reason for it, and I will not have it done. I am going out now to speak to the General. Look at the clock. If I am not back in ten minutes, go out at the back with your cousin, take the path behind the stables, and make all the haste you can to La Mariniere. It will be light, you cannot lose your way. Only keep in the shelter of the trees, that those people over in the wood may not see you."
Riette gazed at him with dark large eyes which seemed to read something behind his words.
"Why do you think you will not come back, papa? Because General Ratoneau is a wicked man?"
"Because Imperial justice may carry me to Sonnay. But the Prefect is my friend," said Monsieur Joseph, gravely. "Go back, and do as I tell you.
Remember, Angelot"s wife is in your care. Take this pistol, and defend her if necessary."
He left her without another word and ran downstairs. In the ground-floor rooms he found the servants waiting, the two men armed, Marie wildly excited, all talking at once, for they had heard from an upper window their master"s conversation with Simon.
Before he could give them any orders, two tall shadows came across the white sand in that unearthly light of moon and dawn, and old Joubard and his son, pushing at the window, were immediately let in by Gigot. They explained that Monsieur Angelot, on his way to the etang des Morts, had stopped at La Joubardiere. He had found Martin, not long returned from Lancilly, busy telling his father the events of the night. He had begged them both to go down to Les Chouettes, to watch quietly about there till his return. They understood very well that his greatest treasure in life was there, and they had started off, Joubard with his gun, not intending to go to the house or disturb Monsieur Joseph. But coming down they found the man Simon had just sent to keep the eastern road, who told them the place was besieged by police and the house to be searched immediately. They took the liberty of depriving him of his carbine, tying him to a tree, and setting a dog to watch him there. Old Joubard explained this to Monsieur Joseph with an air of apology.
"Thank you. You could not have done better, Joubard. Listen, I am going out to speak to General Ratoneau. I have told Mademoiselle Henriette, if I am not back in ten minutes, to take Madame Ange to La Mariniere. If the General insists on my going off to Sonnay, this will not be a place for ladies. Perhaps, Marie, you had better go with them. The police will try to insist on searching the house. I will not have it searched, without a warrant from Monsieur le Prefet. You four men, I leave it in your care. Defend the house, as you know I should defend it."
Tobie chuckled. "Spoil their beauty, eh!" and went on loading his gun.
Old Joubard"s face had lengthened slightly. "Anything within the law,"
he muttered. "But I am not a Chouan, dear little monsieur, nor is Martin--no!"
"Chouan or not, you are my friends, all of you," said Monsieur Joseph; and he turned and left them.
He went back to his room, wrote a short letter to his brother Urbain, and left it on the table. Then he took his sword, crossed himself, and went out into the slowly lightening day.
Ratoneau was waiting for him under the trees, just out of sight of the house, and they were practically alone. A groom held the General"s horse at some little distance; Simon waited in the background, skulking behind the trees, and the other men were watching the house from various points. The road which pa.s.sed Les Chouettes on the north crept on westward, and skirted that same wood of tall oaks, chestnuts, and firs where Monsieur Joseph"s Chouan friends had been hidden from the Prefect and the General. The wood, with little undergrowth, but thickly carpeted with dead leaves, sloped down to the south; on its highest edge a line of old oaks, hollow and enormous, stood like grim sentinels. It was under one of these, hidden from the house by a corner of the wood, that Monsieur Joseph met the General.
Ratoneau was considerably cooler than when he had left Lancilly. His manner was less violent, but even more insolent than usual. He looked at his watch as Monsieur Joseph came up, walking over the rough gra.s.s with the light step of a boy.
"What do you mean, monsieur, by keeping an Imperial officer waiting?" he said. "Ten minutes? I have been standing here twenty, and you had no right to ask for one. You forget who you are, monsieur, and who I am."
"Kindly enlighten me on these points, Monsieur le General," said Monsieur Joseph, smiling cheerfully.
"I will enlighten you so far--that you are twice a traitor, and the worst of a whole band of traitors."
"Et puis, monsieur? Once--it is possible from your point of view, but how twice?" said Monsieur Joseph, with that air of happy curiosity which had often, in earlier years, misled his enemies to their undoing.
Ratoneau stared at him, muttered an oath, and stammered out: "Not content with plotting against His Majesty"s government--why you--you, monsieur--are aiding and abetting that nephew of yours in this scandalous affair of his marriage. Sapristi! you look as innocent as a new-born child! You laugh, monsieur! Do you suppose the Emperor will not learn the truth about this marriage? Yes, I can tell you, you will bitterly repent this night"s work--Monsieur de Sainfoy and all of you.
And to begin with, that accursed nephew of yours will spend his honeymoon in prison. I have not yet seen my way through the ins and outs of the affair--I do not know how Monsieur de Sainfoy heard of the Emperor"s intention--but at least I can have my revenge on your nephew and I will--I will!"
"Ah!" Monsieur Joseph laughed slightly. "I would not be too sure, monsieur. You can prove nothing against Ange. His father, let me tell you, has set him right with the Emperor. He is in no danger at all, unless from your personal malice. The prize you intended to have has been given to him. It is no doing of his family. I do not believe the Emperor will punish him or them. And--unless he values your services more highly than I should think probable, I fancy he will see excuses for Monsieur de Sainfoy!"
"No doing of his family! The intrigue has been going on for weeks,"
cried Ratoneau. "When have I not seen that odious boy pushing himself at Lancilly? Detestable little hound! as insolent as yourself, and far more of a fool. I have always hated him--always--since the day I first saw him in your house, the day when we met a herd of cattle in the lane, and he dared to laugh at my horse"s misbehaviour. Little sc.u.m of the earth!
if I had him under my heel--What are we losing time for? What do you want to say to me? It is my duty to arrest you, and to search your house for conspirators and arms, in the name of the Emperor."
"Yes; I know all that," said Monsieur Joseph, gently, with his head a little on one side.
He was wondering, as he wondered on first acquaintance with this man, for how long he would be able to refrain from striking him in the face.
He was afraid that it would not, at this juncture, be a wise thing to do. The two girls in the house were much on his mind; perhaps a presentiment of something of this sort had made him arrange for their escape.