XXIX

"MASTER DEVIL" DOLTAIRE

The bells of some shattered church were calling to vespers, the

sun was sinking behind the flaming autumn woods, as once more I

entered the St. Louis Gate, with the grenadiers and a detachment of

artillery, the British colours hoisted on a gun-carriage. Till this

hour I had ever entered and left this town a captive, a price set

on my head, and in the very street where now I walked I had gone

with a rope round my neck, abused and maltreated. I saw our flag

replace the golden lilies of France on the citadel where Doltaire

had baited me, and at the top of Mountain Street, near to the

bishop's palace, our colours also flew.

Every step I took was familiar, yet unfamiliar too. It was a

disfigured town, where a hungry, distracted people huddled among

ruins, and begged for mercy and for food, nor found time in the

general overwhelming to think of the gallant Montcalm, lying in his

shell-made grave at the chapel of the Ursulines, not fifty steps

from where I had looked through the tapestry on Alixe and Doltaire.

The convent was almost deserted now, and as I passed it, on my way

to the cathedral, I took off my hat; for how knew I but that she

I loved best lay there, too, as truly a heroine as the admirable

Montcalm was hero! A solitary bell was clanging on the chapel as

I went by, and I saw three nuns steal past me with bowed heads.

I longed to stop them and ask them of Alixe, for I felt sure that

the Church knew where she was, living or dead, though none of all

I asked knew aught of her, not even the Chevalier de la Darante,

who had come to our camp the night before, accompanied by Monsieur

Joannes, the town major, with terms of surrender.

I came to the church of the Recollets as I wandered; for now,

for a little time, I seemed bewildered and incapable, lost in a

maze of dreadful imaginings. I entered the door of the church,

and stumbled upon a body. Hearing footsteps ahead in the dusk,

I passed up the aisle, and came upon a pile of debris. Looking

up, I could see the stars shining through a hole in the roof,

Hearing a noise beyond, I went on, and there, seated on the high

altar, was the dwarf who had snatched the cup of rum out of

the fire the night that Mathilde had given the crosses to the

revellers. He gave a low, wild laugh, and hugged a bottle to his

breast. Almost at his feet, half naked, with her face on the lowest

step of the altar, her feet touching the altar itself, was the

girl--his sister--who had kept her drunken lover from assaulting

him. The girl was dead--there was a knife-wound in her breast. Sick

at the sight I left the place, and went on, almost mechanically,

to Voban's house. It was level with the ground, a crumpled heap of

ruins. I passed Lancy's house, in front of which I had fought with

Gabord; it too was broken to pieces.

As I turned away I heard a loud noise, as of an explosion, and I

supposed it to be some magazine. I thought of it no more at the

time. Voban must be found; that was more important. I must know

of Alixe first, and I felt sure that if any one guessed her

whereabouts it would be he: she would have told him where she was

going, if she had fled; if she were dead, who so likely to know,

this secret, elusive, vengeful watcher? Of Doltaire I had heard

nothing; I would seek him out when I knew of Alixe. He could not

escape me in this walled town. I passed on for a time without

direction, for I seemed not to know where I might find the barber.

Our sentries already patrolled the streets, and our bugles were

calling on the heights, with answering calls from the fleet in

the basin. Night came down quickly, the stars shone out in the

perfect blue, and, as I walked along, broken walls, shattered

houses, solitary pillars, looked mystically strange. It was

painfully quiet, as if a beaten people had crawled away into the

holes our shot and shell had made, to hide their misery. Now and

again a gaunt face looked out from a hiding-place, and drew back

again in fear at sight of me. Once a drunken woman spat at me and

cursed me; once I was fired at; and many times from dark corners

I heard voices crying, "Sauvez-moi--ah, sauvez-moi, bon Dieu!"

Once I stood for many minutes and watched our soldiers giving

biscuits and their own share of rum to homeless French peasants

hovering round the smouldering ruins of a house which carcasses had

destroyed.

And now my wits came back to me, my purposes, the power to act,

which for a couple of hours had seemed to be in abeyance. I

hurried through narrow streets to the cathedral. There it stood,

a shattered mass, its sides all broken, its roof gone, its tall

octagonal tower alone substantial and unchanged. Coming to its

rear, I found Babette's little house, with open door, and I went

in. The old grandfather sat in his corner, with a lighted candle

on the table near him, across his knees Jean's coat that I had

worn. He only babbled nonsense to my questioning, and, after

calling aloud to Babette and getting no reply, I started for

the Intendance.

I had scarcely left the house when I saw some French peasants

coming towards me with a litter. A woman, walking behind the

litter, carried a lantern, and one of our soldiers of artillery

attended and directed. I ran forward, and discovered Voban,

mortally hurt. The woman gave a cry, and spoke my name in a kind

of surprise and relief; and the soldier, recognizing me, saluted.

I sent him for a surgeon, and came on with the hurt man to the

little house. Soon I was alone with him save for Babette, and her

I sent for a priest. As soon as I had seen Voban I guessed what

had happened: he had tried for his revenge at last. After a little

time he knew me, but at first he could not speak.

"What has happened--the Palace?" said I.

He nodded.

"You blew it up--with Bigot?" I asked.

His reply was a whisper, and his face twitched with pain:

"Not--with Bigot."

I gave him some cordial, which he was inclined to refuse. It

revived him, but I saw he could live only a few hours. Presently

he made an effort. "I will tell you," he whispered.

"Tell me first of my wife," said I. "Is she alive?--is she alive?"

If a smile could have been upon his lips then, I saw one

there--good Voban! I put my ear down, and my heart almost stopped

beating, until I heard him say, "Find Mathilde."

"Where?" asked I.

"In the Valdoche Hills," he answered, "where the Gray Monk

lives--by the Tall Calvary."

He gasped with pain. I let him rest awhile, and eased the

bandages on him, and at last he told his story:

"I am to be gone soon. For two years I have wait for the good

time to kill him--Bigot--to send him and his palace to hell. I can

not tell you how I work to do it. It is no matter--no. From an old

cellar I mine, and at last I get the powder lay beneath him--his

palace. So. But he does not come to the Palace much this many

months, and Madame Cournal is always with him, and it is hard to

do the thing in other ways. But I laugh when the English come in

the town, and when I see Bigot fly to his palace alone to get his

treasure-chest I think it is my time. So I ask the valet, and he

say he is in the private room that lead to the treasure-place.

Then I come back quick to the secret spot and fire my mine. In ten

minutes all will be done. I go at once to his room again, alone. I

pass through the one room, and come to the other. It is a room with

one small barred window. If he is there, I will say a word to him

that I have wait long to say, then shut the door on us both--for I

am sick of life--and watch him and laugh at him till the end comes.

If he is in the other room, then I have another way as sure--"

He paused, exhausted, and I waited till he could again go on. At

last he made a great effort, and continued: "I go back to the first

room, and he is not there. I pass soft, to the treasure-room, and I

see him kneel beside a chest, looking in. His back is to me. I hear

him laugh to himself. I shut the door, turn the key, go to the

window and throw it out, and look at him again. But now he stand

and turn to me, and then I see--I see it is not Bigot, but M'sieu'

Doltaire!

"I am sick when I see that, and at first I can not speak, my

tongue stick in my mouth so dry. 'Has Voban turn robber?' m'sieu'

say. I put out my hand and try to speak again--but no. 'What did

you throw from the window?' he ask. 'And what's the matter, my

Voban?' 'My God,' I say at him now, 'I thought you are Bigot!'

I point to the floor. 'Powder!' I whisper.

"His eyes go like fire so terrible; he look to the window, take

a quick angry step to me, but stand still. Then he point to the

window. 'The key, Voban?' he say; and I answer, 'Yes.' He get

pale; then he go and try the door, look close at the walls, try

them--quick, quick, stop, feel for a panel, then try again, stand

still, and lean against the table. It is no use to call; no one

can hear, for it is all roar outside, and these walls are solid

and very thick.

"'How long?' he say, and take out his watch. 'Five minutes--maybe,'

I answer. He put his watch on the table, and sit down on a bench by

it, and for a little minute he do not speak, but look at me close,

and not angry, as you would think. 'Voban,' he say in a low voice,

'Bigot was a thief.' He point to the chest. 'He stole from the

King--my father. He stole your Mathilde from you! He should have

died. We have both been blunderers, Voban, blunderers,' he say;

'things have gone wrong with us. We have lost all.' There is little

time. 'Tell me one thing,' he go on: 'Is Mademoiselle Duvarney

safe--do you know?' I tell him yes, and he smile, and take from

his pocket something, and lay it against his lips, and then put

it back in his breast.

"'You are not afraid to die, Voban?' he ask. I answer no. 'Shake

hands with me, my friend,' he speak, and I do so that. 'Ah, pardon,

pardon, m'sieu',' I say. 'No, no, Voban; it was to be,' he answer.

'We shall meet again, comrade--eh, if we can?' he speak on, and he

turn away from me and look to the sky through the window. Then he

look at his watch, and get to his feet, and stand there still. I

kiss my crucifix. He reach out and touch it, and bring his fingers

to his lips. 'Who can tell--perhaps--perhaps!' he say. For a little

minute--ah, it seem like a year, and it is so still, so still he

stand there, and then he put his hand over the watch, lift it up,

and shut his eyes, as if time is all done. While you can count ten

it is so, and then the great crash come."

For a long time Voban lay silent again. I gave him more cordial,

and he revived and ended his tale. "I am a blunderer, as m'sieu'

say," he went on, "for he is killed, not Bigot and me, and only a

little part of the palace go to pieces. And so they fetch me here,

and I wish--my God in Heaven, I wish I go with M'sieu' Doltaire."

But he followed him a little later.

Two hours afterwards I went to the Intendance, and there I found

that the body of my enemy had been placed in the room where I had

last seen him with Alixe. He lay on the same couch where she had

lain. The flag of France covered his broken body, but his face was

untouched--as it had been in life, haunting, fascinating, though

the shifting lights were gone, the fine eyes closed. A noble peace

hid all that was sardonic; not even Gabord would now have called

him "Master Devil." I covered up his face and left him there--

peasant and prince--candles burning at his head and feet, and the

star of Louis on his shattered breast; and I saw him no more.

All that night I walked the ramparts, thinking, remembering,

hoping, waiting for the morning; and when I saw the light break

over those far eastern parishes, wasted by fire and sword, I set

out on a journey to the Valdoche Hills.