He swore at that, feeling the stroke go home.
"You must be mad!" he said, glaring at her. "Cannot you see that the man is what I tell you? Look at him! Look at him, I say! Listen to him! Has he a word to say for himself?"
Still she did not look.
"It is late," she replied coldly. "And I am not very well. If you have done, quite done--perhaps, you will leave me, Monsieur."
"MON DIEU! he exclaimed, shrugging his shoulders, and grinding his teeth in impotent rage. You are mad! I have told you the truth, and you will not believe it. Well--on your head be it then, Mademoiselle. I have no more to say! You will see."
And with that, without more, fairly conquered by her staunchness, he saluted her, gave the word to the sergeant, turned and went down the path.
The sergeant went after him, the lanthorn swaying in his hand. And we two were left alone. The frogs were croaking in the pool, a bat flew round in circles; the house, the garden, all lay quiet under the darkness, as on the night which I first came to it.
And would to Heaven I had never come that was the cry in my heart. Would to Heaven I had never seen this woman, whose n.o.bleness and faith were a continual shame to me; a reproach branding me every hour I stood in her presence with all vile and hateful names. The man just gone, coa.r.s.e, low-bred, brutal soldier as he was, manflogger and drilling-block, had yet found heart to feel my baseness, and words in which to denounce it.
What, then, would she say, when the truth came home to her? What shape should I take in her eyes then? How should I be remembered through all the years then?
Then? But now? What was she thinking now, at this moment as she stood silent and absorbed near the stone seat, a shadowy figure with face turned from me? Was she recalling the man"s words, fitting them to the facts and the past, adding this and that circ.u.mstance? Was she, though she had rebuffed him in the body, collating, now he was gone, all that he had said, and out of these sc.r.a.ps piecing together the d.a.m.ning truth?
Was she, for all that she had said, beginning to see me as I was? The thought tortured me. I could brook uncertainty no longer. I went nearer to her and touched her sleeve.
"Mademoiselle," I said in a voice which sounded hoa.r.s.e and unnatural even in my own ears, "do you believe this of me?"
She started violently, and turned.
"Pardon, Monsieur!" she murmured, pa.s.sing her hand over her brow; "I had forgotten that you were here. Do I believe what?"
"What that man said of me," I muttered.
"That!" she exclaimed. And then she stood a moment gazing at me in a strange fashion. "Do I believe that, Monsieur? But come, come!" she continued impetuously. "Come, and I will show you if I believe it. But not here."
She turned as she spoke, and led the way on the instant into the house through the parlour door, which stood half open. The room inside was pitch dark, but she took me fearlessly by the hand and led me quickly through it, and along the pa.s.sage, until we came to the cheerful lighted hall, where a great fire burned on the hearth. All traces of the soldiers" occupation had been swept away. But the room was empty.
She led me to the fire, and there in the full light, no longer a shadowy creature, but red-lipped, brilliant, throbbing with life and beauty, she stood opposite me--her eyes shining, her colour high, her breast heaving.
"Do I believe it?" she said in a thrilling voice. "I will tell you. M.
de Cocheforet"s hiding-place is in the hut behind the fern-stack, two furlongs beyond the village on the road to Auch. You know now what no one else knows, he and I and Madame excepted. You hold in your hands his life and my honour; and you know also, M. de Berault, whether I believe that tale."
"My G.o.d!" I cried. And I stood looking at her until something of the horror in my eyes crept into hers, and she shuddered and stepped back from me.
"What is it? What is it?" she whispered, clasping her hands. And with all the colour gone suddenly from her cheeks she peered trembling into the corners and towards the door. "There is no one here."
I forced myself to speak, though I was trembling all over like a man in an ague. "No, Mademoiselle, there is no one here," I muttered. "There is no one here." And then I let my head fall on my breast, and I stood before her, the statue of despair. Had she felt a grain of suspicion, a grain of doubt, my bearing must have opened her eyes; but her mind was cast in so n.o.ble a mould that, having once thought ill of me and been converted, she could feel no doubt again. She must trust all in all.
A little recovered from her fright, she stood looking at me in great wonder; and at last she had a thought--
"You are not well?" she said suddenly. "It is your old wound, Monsieur.
Now I have it?"
"Yes, Mademoiselle," I muttered faintly, "it is."
"I will call Clon!" she cried impetuously. And then, with a sob: "Ah!
poor Clon! He is gone. But there is still Louis. I will call him and he will get you something."
She was gone from the room before I could stop her, and I stood leaning against the table possessor at last of the secret which I had come so far to win; able in a moment to open the door and go out into the night, and make use of it--and yet the most unhappy of men. The sweat stood on my brow; my eyes wandered round the room; I turned towards the door, with some mad thought of flight--of flight from her, from the house, from everything; and I had actually taken a step towards this, when on the door, the outer door, there came a sudden hurried knocking which jarred every nerve in my body. I started, and stopped. I stood a moment in the middle of the floor gazing at the door, as at a ghost. Then, glad of action, glad of anything that might relieve the tension of my feelings, I strode to it and pulled it sharply open.
On the threshold, his flushed face lit up by the light behind me, stood one of the knaves whom I had brought with me to Auch. He had been running, and panted heavily; but he had kept his wits, and the instant I, appeared he grasped my sleeve.
"Ah! Monsieur, the very man!" he cried. "Quick! come this instant, lose not a moment, and you may yet be first. They have the secret! The soldiers have found Monsieur!"
"Found him?" I echoed. "M. de Cocheforet?"
"No; but they know the place where he lies. It was found by accident.
The Lieutenant was gathering his men when I came away. If we are quick, we may yet be first."
"But the place?" I said.
"I could not hear," he answered bluntly. "We must hang on their skirts, and at the last moment strike in. It is the only way, Monsieur."
The pair of pistols I had taken from the shock-headed man lay on a chest by the door. Without waiting for more I s.n.a.t.c.hed them up and my hat, and joined him, and in a moment we were running down the garden. I looked back once before we pa.s.sed the gate, and I saw the light streaming out through the door which. I had left open; and I fancied that for an instant a figure darkened the gap. But the fancy only strengthened the one single purpose, the iron resolve, which had taken possession of me and all my thoughts. I must be first; I must antic.i.p.ate the Lieutenant; I must make the arrest myself. I must be first. And I ran on only the faster.
We were across the meadow and in the wood in a moment. There, instead of keeping along the common path, I boldly singled out--my senses seemed to be preternaturally keen--the smaller trail by which Clon had brought us. Along this I ran unfalteringly, avoiding logs and pitfalls as by instinct, and following all its turns and twists, until we came to the back of the inn, and could hear the murmur of subdued voices in the village street, the sharp low word of command, and the clink of weapons; and could see over and between the houses the dull glare of lanthorns and torches.
I grasped my man"s arm, and crouched down listening. When I had heard enough, "Where is your mate?" I said in his ear.
"With them," he muttered.
"Then come," I whispered rising. "I have seen what I want. Let us go."
But he caught me by the arm and detained me.
"You don"t know the way," he said. "Steady, steady, Monsieur. You go too fast. They are just moving. Let us join them, and strike in when the time comes. We must let them guide us."
"Fool!" I said, shaking off his hand. "I tell you, I know where he is! I know where they are going. Come, and we will pluck the fruit while they are on the road to it."
His only answer was an exclamation of surprise. At that moment the lights began to move. The Lieutenant was starting. The moon was not yet up, the sky was grey and cloudy; to advance where we were was to step into a wall of blackness. But we had lost too much already, and I did not hesitate. Bidding my companion follow me and use his legs, I sprang through a low fence which rose before us; then stumbling blindly over some broken ground in the rear of the houses, I came with a fall or two to a little watercourse with steep sides. Through this I plunged recklessly and up the farther side, and, breathless and panting, gained the road, beyond the village, and fifty yards in advance of the Lieutenant"s troop.
They had only two lanthorns burning, and we were beyond the circle of light cast by these; while the steady tramp of so many footsteps covered the noise we made. We were in no danger of being noticed, and in a twinkling we turned our backs, and as fast as we could we ran down the road. Fortunately, they were thinking more of secrecy than speed, and in a minute we had doubled the distance between them and us. In two minutes their lights were mere sparks shining in the gloom behind us. We lost even the tramp of their feet. Then I began to look out and go more slowly, peering into the shadows on either side for the fernstack.
On one hand the hill rose steeply, on the other it fell away to the stream. On neither side was close wood, or my difficulties had been immensely increased; but scattered oak trees stood here and there among the bracken. This helped me, and presently, on the upper side, I came upon the dense substance of the stack looming black against the lighter hill.
My heart beat fast, but it was no time for thought. Bidding the man in a whisper to follow me and be ready to back me up, I climbed the bank softly, and, with a pistol in my hand, felt my way to the rear of the stack, thinking to find a hut there, set against the fern, and M.
Cocheforet in it. But I found no hut. There was none; and, moreover, it was so dark now we were off the road, that it came upon me suddenly, as I stood between the hill and the stack, that I had undertaken a very difficult thing. The hut behind the fern stack. But how far behind? how far from it? The dark slope stretched above us, infinite, immeasurable shrouded in night. To begin to climb it in search of a tiny hut, possibly well hidden and hard to find in daylight, seemed an endeavour as hopeless as to meet with the needle in the hay! And now while I stood, chilled and doubting, almost despairing, the steps of the troop in the road began to grow audible, began to come nearer.
"Well, Monsieur le Capitaine?" the man beside me muttered--in wonder why I stood. "Which way? or they will be before us yet."
I tried to think, to reason it out; to consider where the hut should be; while the wind sighed through the oaks, and here and there I could hear an acorn fall. But the thing pressed too close on me; my thoughts would not be hurried, and at last I said at a venture,--
"Up the hill. Straight up from the stack."
He did not demur, and we plunged at the ascent, knee-deep in bracken and furze, sweating at every pore with our exertions, and hearing the troop come every moment nearer on the road below. Doubtless they knew exactly whither to go! Forced to stop and take breath when we had scrambled up fifty yards or so, I saw their lanthorns shining like moving glow-worms; I could even hear the clink of steel. For all I could tell, the hut might be down there, and we be moving from it. But it was too late to go back now--they were close to the fern-stack; and in despair I turned to the hill again. A dozen steps and I stumbled. I rose and plunged on again; again stumbled. Then I found that I was treading level earth.
And--was it water I saw before me, below me? or some mirage of the sky?