"Hold!" he gasped in French, in a low, hoarse tone. "Louis Henault,
don't you know me? Have you so soon forgotten your fellow-student, Paul
Olbrich?"
The voice and the name caused me to start.
"_You_!" I cried, peering into his face, and in the semi-darkness
discovering the scar upon his cheek that he had received in the fencing
school at Konigswinter. "You, Paul, my best friend! Alas that you are
a Prussian, and we meet here as enemies!"
"As enemies?" he repeated, in a strange, harsh tone. "Yes, Louis, you
are right," he added bitterly,--"as enemies."
"Why are you here?" I inquired breathlessly. "Why are you disguised as
a French workman? It is my duty to arrest you--to--"
"But you will not. Remember, we were friends beside the Rhine, and we
can only be enemies to the outside world. Surely you, of all men, will
not betray me!"
"When last I heard of you, two years ago," I said, "you were a
lieutenant of dragoons. To-night you are here, inside Paris,
disguised."
"To tell the truth," he replied quickly, "it is a love escapade. Let me
get away quickly beyond the walls, and no one will know that you have
detected me. See, over there," and he pointed to a portion of the wall
deep in the shadow. "There is my _fiancee_. I have dared to pass
through your lines to rescue her before the final onslaught."
I peered in the direction indicated, and could just distinguish a
figure, hidden by a cloak, and closely veiled.
"Quick," he continued; "there is no time for reflection. If you raise
an alarm, my fate is sealed; if you allow us to proceed, two lives will
be made happy. Do you consent?" Grasping my hand, he pressed it hard,
adding, "Do, Louis, for _her_ sake!"
Muffled footsteps and the clank of arms broke the quiet. Three officers
were approaching.
"Go. May God protect you!" I replied; and, turning sharply, tramped
onward in the opposite direction, while my old friend, and the woman he
had rescued from starvation, were a second later lost in the darkness in
the direction of the Prussian camp.
Scarcely had I taken a dozen paces when there were shouts, followed by
shots rapidly exchanged.
"Spies!" I heard one of our men exclaim; "and, _sacre_! they've
escaped!"
At that moment the officers who had approached ordered me to halt, and
proceeded to question me as to whom I had been speaking with. I
admitted that the man was a stranger, and that I had allowed him to pass
out of the city. Thus all was discovered, and I was at once arrested as
a traitor--as one who had rendered assistance to a Prussian spy!
The penalty was death. The stern, grey-haired general before whom I was
taken half an hour later pronounced sentence; and, without ceremony, I
was hurried off to execution. Bah! Fate has always been unkind to me.
It would have been better had I fallen with four of my comrades' bullets
in my breast, than that I should have continued to drag out an existence
till to-day. But the bombardment had recommenced vigorously; and as I
was being led along, a shell fell close to my escort, and, bursting,
killed two of the poor fellows, and demoralised the rest.
I saw my chance, and darted away. A moment later, I was lost among the
trees.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Three hours later.
Breathlessly I mounted the long flights of stairs that led to my home,
and opened the door with my key. Entering our little salon, I looked
around. In the cold, grey light of dawn, the place looked unutterably
cheerless, and the thunder of the guns was causing the windows to
rattle. Passing quickly into the bedroom, I found the ceiling open to
the sky, and a huge gap in the wall. A shell had fallen, and completely
wrecked it.
"Rose!" I cried. "Rose, I have returned."
There was no response. Another roar like the roll of thunder, and the
whole place vibrated, as though an earthquake had occurred.
Where was Rose? I dashed back into the salon, and there, upon a table,
I found a letter addressed to me in her familiar hand. Tearing it open,
I read eagerly the three brief lines it contained, then staggered back,
as if I had received a blow. A second later, I felt conscious of the
presence of some one at my elbow; and, turning, found Mariette, our
maid-of-all-work.
"My wife--where is my wife?" I gasped.
"Madame has gone, m'sieur," the girl replied in her Gascon accent.
"Last night a man called for her, and she went out, leaving a note for
you."
"A man?" I cried. "Describe him. What was he like?"
"I only caught one glimpse of him, m'sieur. He was fair, and had a long
red scar across his cheek."
"_A scar_?" I shrieked in dismay, as the terrible truth dawned suddenly
upon me. Rose, whom I had first met in Cologne, when a student on the
Rhine-bank, had told me that I was not her first love; and now I
remembered that she had long ago been acquainted with my fellow-student,
Paul Olbrich.
It was my own wife whom I had assisted to elope with my enemy!
Ah! time has not effaced her memory. My sorrow is still as bitter
to-day as it was in that cold December dawn, with the horrors of war
around me. My life has become soured, and my hair grey. Since that
eventful night, I have wandered in strange lands, endeavouring to stifle
my grief; for, still under sentence of death as a spy, I have been an
exile and an outlaw until to-day.
What, you ask, has become of _her_?
Far away, in a secluded valley in the Harz, under the shadow of the
mystic Brocken, there is a plain white cross in the village
burying-ground, bearing the words, "Rose Henault, 1872."
My enemy, Paul Olbrich, a year after the war had ended, succeeded to the
family title and estates; and to-day he is one of the most prominent men
in Europe, and acts as the diplomatic representative of Germany at a
certain Court that must be nameless.
Truly, Fate has been unkind to me. To-day, for the first time, I have
taken my skeleton from its cupboard. Would that I could bury it
forever!