“No! no, do not give it to Pierre! Pierre is eccentric. He loses
things; and such a pretty ring!”
“Cat!” said the old man, savagely. Suddenly the old woman said, rather
more loudly than was necessary:
“Wait! I shall tell you something about a ring.” There was something in
the sound of her voice that jarred upon me. Perhaps it was my
hyper-sensitiveness, wrought up as I was to such a pitch of nervous
excitement, but I seemed to think that she was not addressing me. As I
stole a glance round the place I saw the eyes of the rats in the bone
heaps, but missed the eyes along the back. But even as I looked I saw
them again appear. The old woman’s “Wait!” had given me a respite from
attack, and the men had sunk back to their reclining posture.
“I once lost a ring—a beautiful diamond hoop that had belonged to a
queen, and which was given to me by a farmer of the taxes, who
afterwards cut his throat because I sent him away. I thought it must
have been stolen, and taxed my people; but I could get no trace. The
police came and suggested that it had found its way to the drain. We
descended—I in my fine clothes, for I would not trust them with my
beautiful ring! I know more of the drains since then, and of rats, too!
but I shall never forget the horror of that place—alive with blazing
eyes, a wall of them just outside the light of our torches. Well, we
got beneath my house. We searched the outlet of the drain, and there in
the filth found my ring, and we came out.
“But we found something else also before we came! As we were coming
toward the opening a lot of sewer rats—human ones this time—came
towards us. They told the police that one of their number had gone into
the drain, but had not returned. He had gone in only shortly before we
had, and, if lost, could hardly be far off. They asked help to seek
him, so we turned back. They tried to prevent me going, but I insisted.
It was a new excitement, and had I not recovered my ring? Not far did
we go till we came on something. There was but little water, and the
bottom of the drain was raised with brick, rubbish, and much matter of
the kind. He had made a fight for it, even when his torch had gone out.
But they were too many for him! They had not been long about it! The
bones were still warm; but they were picked clean. They had even eaten
their own dead ones and there were bones of rats as well as of the man.
They took it cool enough those other—the human ones—and joked of their
comrade when they found him dead, though they would have helped him
living. Bah! what matters it—life or death?”
“And had you no fear?” I asked her.
“Fear!” she said with a laugh. “Me have fear? Ask Pierre! But I was
younger then, and, as I came through that horrible drain with its wall
of greedy eyes, always moving with the circle of the light from the
torches, I did not feel easy. I kept on before the men, though! It is a
way I have! I never let the men get it before me. All I want is a
chance and a means! And they ate him up—took every trace away except
the bones; and no one knew it, nor no sound of him was ever heard!”
Here she broke into a chuckling fit of the ghastliest merriment which
it was ever my lot to hear and see. A great poetess describes her
heroine singing: “Oh! to see or hear her singing! Scarce I know which
is the divinest.”
And I can apply the same idea to the old crone—in all save the
divinity, for I scarce could tell which was the most hellish—the harsh,
malicious, satisfied, cruel laugh, or the leering grin, and the
horrible square opening of the mouth like a tragic mask, and the yellow
gleam of the few discoloured teeth in the shapeless gums. In that laugh
and with that grin and the chuckling satisfaction I knew as well as if
it had been spoken to me in words of thunder that my murder was
settled, and the murderers only bided the proper time for its
accomplishment. I could read between the lines of her gruesome story
the commands to her accomplices. “Wait,” she seemed to say, “bide your
time. I shall strike the first blow. Find the weapon for me, and I
shall make the opportunity! He shall not escape! Keep him quiet, and
then no one will be wiser. There will be no outcry, and the rats will
do their work!”
It was growing darker and darker; the night was coming. I stole a
glance round the shanty, still all the same! The bloody axe in the
corner, the heaps of filth, and the eyes on the bone heaps and in the
crannies of the floor.
Pierre had been still ostensibly filling his pipe; he now struck a
light and began to puff away at it. The old woman said:
“Dear heart, how dark it is! Pierre, like a good lad, light the lamp!”
Pierre got up and with the lighted match in his hand touched the wick
of a lamp which hung at one side of the entrance to the shanty, and
which had a reflector that threw the light all over the place. It was
evidently that which was used for their sorting at night.
“Not that, stupid! Not that! the lantern!” she called out to him.
He immediately blew it out, saying: “All right, mother I’ll find it,”
and he hustled about the left corner of the room—the old woman saying
through the darkness:
“The lantern! the lantern! Oh! That is the light that is most useful to
us poor folks. The lantern was the friend of the revolution! It is the
friend of the chiffonier! It helps us when all else fails.”
Hardly had she said the word when there was a kind of creaking of the
whole place, and something was steadily dragged over the roof.
Again I seemed to read between the lines of her words. I knew the
lesson of the lantern.
“One of you get on the roof with a noose and strangle him as he passes
out if we fail within.”
As I looked out of the opening I saw the loop of a rope outlined black
against the lurid sky. I was now, indeed, beset!
Pierre was not long in finding the lantern. I kept my eyes fixed
through the darkness on the old woman. Pierre struck his light, and by
its flash I saw the old woman raise from the ground beside her where it
had mysteriously appeared, and then hide in the folds of her gown, a
long sharp knife or dagger. It seemed to be like a butcher’s sharpening
iron fined to a keen point.
The lantern was lit.
“Bring it here, Pierre,” she said. “Place it in the doorway where we
can see it. See how nice it is! It shuts out the darkness from us; it
is just right!”
Just right for her and her purposes! It threw all its light on my face,
leaving in gloom the faces of both Pierre and the woman, who sat
outside of me on each side.
I felt that the time of action was approaching, but I knew now that the
first signal and movement would come from the woman, and so watched
her.
I was all unarmed, but I had made up my mind what to do. At the first
movement I would seize the butcher’s axe in the right-hand corner and
fight my way out. At least, I would die hard. I stole a glance round to
fix its exact locality so that I could not fail to seize it at the
first effort, for then, if ever, time and accuracy would be precious.
Good God! It was gone! All the horror of the situation burst upon me;
but the bitterest thought of all was that if the issue of the terrible
position should be against me Alice would infallibly suffer. Either she
would believe me false—and any lover, or any one who has ever been one,
can imagine the bitterness of the thought—or else she would go on
loving long after I had been lost to her and to the world, so that her
life would be broken and embittered, shattered with disappointment and
despair. The very magnitude of the pain braced me up and nerved me to
bear the dread scrutiny of the plotters.
I think I did not betray myself. The old woman was watching me as a cat
does a mouse; she had her right hand hidden in the folds of her gown,
clutching, I knew, that long, cruel-looking dagger. Had she seen any
disappointment in my face she would, I felt, have known that the moment
had come, and would have sprung on me like a tigress, certain of taking
me unprepared.
I looked out into the night, and there I saw new cause for danger.
Before and around the hut were at a little distance some shadowy forms;
they were quite still, but I knew that they were all alert and on
guard. Small chance for me now in that direction.
Again I stole a glance round the place. In moments of great excitement
and of great danger, which is excitement, the mind works very quickly,
and the keenness of the faculties which depend on the mind grows in
proportion. I now felt this. In an instant I took in the whole
situation. I saw that the axe had been taken through a small hole made
in one of the rotten boards. How rotten they must be to allow of such a
thing being done without a particle of noise.
The hut was a regular murder-trap, and was guarded all around. A
garroter lay on the roof ready to entangle me with his noose if I
should escape the dagger of the old hag. In front the way was guarded
by I know not how many watchers. And at the back was a row of desperate
men—I had seen their eyes still through the crack in the boards of the
floor, when last I looked—as they lay prone waiting for the signal to
start erect. If it was to be ever, now for it!
As nonchalantly as I could I turned slightly on my stool so as to get
my right leg well under me. Then with a sudden jump, turning my head,
and guarding it with my hands, and with the fighting instinct of the
knights of old, I breathed my lady’s name, and hurled myself against
the back wall of the hut.
Watchful as they were, the suddenness of my movement surprised both
Pierre and the old woman. As I crashed through the rotten timbers I saw
the old woman rise with a leap like a tiger and heard her low gasp of
baffled rage. My feet lit on something that moved, and as I jumped away
I knew that I had stepped on the back of one of the row of men lying on
their faces outside the hut. I was torn with nails and splinters, but
otherwise unhurt. Breathless I rushed up the mound in front of me,
hearing as I went the dull crash of the shanty as it collapsed into a
mass.
It was a nightmare climb. The mound, though but low, was awfully steep,
and with each step I took the mass of dust and cinders tore down with
me and gave way under my feet. The dust rose and choked me; it was
sickening, fœtid, awful; but my climb was, I felt, for life or death,
and I struggled on. The seconds seemed hours; but the few moments I had
in starting, combined with my youth and strength, gave me a great
advantage, and, though several forms struggled after me in deadly
silence which was more dreadful than any sound, I easily reached the
top. Since then I have climbed the cone of Vesuvius, and as I struggled
up that dreary steep amid the sulphurous fumes the memory of that awful
night at Montrouge came back to me so vividly that I almost grew faint.
The mound was one of the tallest in the region of dust, and as I
struggled to the top, panting for breath and with my heart beating like
a sledge-hammer, I saw away to my left the dull red gleam of the sky,
and nearer still the flashing of lights. Thank God! I knew where I was
now and where lay the road to Paris!
For two or three seconds I paused and looked back. My pursuers were
still well behind me, but struggling up resolutely, and in deadly
silence. Beyond, the shanty was a wreck—a mass of timber and moving
forms. I could see it well, for flames were already bursting out; the
rags and straw had evidently caught fire from the lantern. Still
silence there! Not a sound! These old wretches could die game, anyhow.
I had no time for more than a passing glance, for as I cast an eye
round the mound preparatory to making my descent I saw several dark
forms rushing round on either side to cut me off on my way. It was now
a race for life. They were trying to head me on my way to Paris, and
with the instinct of the moment I dashed down to the right-hand side. I
was just in time, for, though I came as it seemed to me down the steep
in a few steps, the wary old men who were watching me turned back, and
one, as I rushed by into the opening between the two mounds in front,
almost struck me a blow with that terrible butcher’s axe. There could
surely not be two such weapons about!
Then began a really horrible chase. I easily ran ahead of the old men,
and even when some younger ones and a few women joined in the hunt I
easily distanced them. But I did not know the way, and I could not even
guide myself by the light in the sky, for I was running away from it. I
had heard that, unless of conscious purpose, hunted men turn always to
the left, and so I found it now; and so, I suppose, knew also my
pursuers, who were more animals than men, and with cunning or instinct
had found out such secrets for themselves: for on finishing a quick
spurt, after which I intended to take a moment’s breathing space, I
suddenly saw ahead of me two or three forms swiftly passing behind a
mound to the right.
I was in the spider’s web now indeed! But with the thought of this new
danger came the resource of the hunted, and so I darted down the next
turning to the right. I continued in this direction for some hundred
yards, and then, making a turn to the left again, felt certain that I
had, at any rate, avoided the danger of being surrounded.
But not of pursuit, for on came the rabble after me, steady, dogged,
relentless, and still in grim silence.
In the greater darkness the mounds seemed now to be somewhat smaller
than before, although—for the night was closing—they looked bigger in
proportion. I was now well ahead of my pursuers, so I made a dart up
the mound in front.
Oh joy of joys! I was close to the edge of this inferno of dustheaps.
Away behind me the red light of Paris was in the sky, and towering up
behind rose the heights of Montmarte—a dim light, with here and there
brilliant points like stars.
Restored to vigour in a moment, I ran over the few remaining mounds of
decreasing size, and found myself on the level land beyond. Even then,
however, the prospect was not inviting. All before me was dark and
dismal, and I had evidently come on one of those dank, low-lying waste
places which are found here and there in the neighbourhood of great
cities. Places of waste and desolation, where the space is required for
the ultimate agglomeration of all that is noxious, and the ground is so
poor as to create no desire of occupancy even in the lowest squatter.
With eyes accustomed to the gloom of the evening, and away now from the
shadows of those dreadful dustheaps, I could see much more easily than
I could a little while ago. It might have been, of course, that the
glare in the sky of the lights of Paris, though the city was some miles
away, was reflected here. Howsoever it was, I saw well enough to take
bearings for certainly some little distance around me.
In front was a bleak, flat waste that seemed almost dead level, with
here and there the dark shimmering of stagnant pools. Seemingly far off
on the right, amid a small cluster of scattered lights, rose a dark
mass of Fort Montrouge, and away to the left in the dim distance,
pointed with stray gleams from cottage windows, the lights in the sky
showed the locality of Bicêtre. A moment’s thought decided me to take
to the right and try to reach Montrouge. There at least would be some
sort of safety, and I might possibly long before come on some of the
cross roads which I knew. Somewhere, not far off, must lie the
strategic road made to connect the outlying chain of forts circling the
city.
Then I looked back. Coming over the mounds, and outlined black against
the glare of the Parisian horizon, I saw several moving figures, and
still a way to the right several more deploying out between me and my
destination. They evidently meant to cut me off in this direction, and
so my choice became constricted; it lay now between going straight
ahead or turning to the left. Stooping to the ground, so as to get the
advantage of the horizon as a line of sight, I looked carefully in this
direction, but could detect no sign of my enemies. I argued that as
they had not guarded or were not trying to guard that point, there was
evidently danger to me there already. So I made up my mind to go
straight on before me.
It was not an inviting prospect, and as I went on the reality grew
worse. The ground became soft and oozy, and now and again gave way
beneath me in a sickening kind of way. I seemed somehow to be going
down, for I saw round me places seemingly more elevated than where I
was, and this in a place which from a little way back seemed dead
level. I looked around, but could see none of my pursuers. This was
strange, for all along these birds of the night had followed me through
the darkness as well as though it was broad daylight. How I blamed
myself for coming out in my light-coloured tourist suit of tweed. The
silence, and my not being able to see my enemies, whilst I felt that
they were watching me, grew appalling, and in the hope of some one not
of this ghastly crew hearing me I raised my voice and shouted several
times. There was not the slightest response; not even an echo rewarded
my efforts. For a while I stood stock still and kept my eyes in one
direction. On one of the rising places around me I saw something dark
move along, then another, and another. This was to my left, and
seemingly moving to head me off.
I thought that again I might with my skill as a runner elude my enemies
at this game, and so with all my speed darted forward.
Splash!
My feet had given way in a mass of slimy rubbish, and I had fallen
headlong into a reeking, stagnant pool. The water and the mud in which
my arms sank up to the elbows was filthy and nauseous beyond
description, and in the suddenness of my fall I had actually swallowed
some of the filthy stuff, which nearly choked me, and made me gasp for
breath. Never shall I forget the moments during which I stood trying to
recover myself almost fainting from the fœtid odour of the filthy pool,
whose white mist rose ghostlike around. Worst of all, with the acute
despair of the hunted animal when he sees the pursuing pack closing on
him, I saw before my eyes whilst I stood helpless the dark forms of my
pursuers moving swiftly to surround me.
It is curious how our minds work on odd matters even when the energies
of thought are seemingly concentrated on some terrible and pressing
need. I was in momentary peril of my life: my safety depended on my
action, and my choice of alternatives coming now with almost every step
I took, and yet I could not but think of the strange dogged persistency
of these old men. Their silent resolution, their steadfast, grim,
persistency even in such a cause commanded, as well as fear, even a
measure of respect. What must they have been in the vigour of their
youth. I could understand now that whirlwind rush on the bridge of
Arcola, that scornful exclamation of the Old Guard at Waterloo!
Unconscious cerebration has its own pleasures, even at such moments;
but fortunately it does not in any way clash with the thought from
which action springs.
I realised at a glance that so far I was defeated in my object, my
enemies as yet had won. They had succeeded in surrounding me on three
sides, and were bent on driving me off to the left-hand, where there
was already some danger for me, for they had left no guard. I accepted
the alternative—it was a case of Hobson’s choice and run. I had to keep
the lower ground, for my pursuers were on the higher places. However,
though the ooze and broken ground impeded me my youth and training made
me able to hold my ground, and by keeping a diagonal line I not only
kept them from gaining on me but even began to distance them. This gave
me new heart and strength, and by this time habitual training was
beginning to tell and my second wind had come. Before me the ground
rose slightly. I rushed up the slope and found before me a waste of
watery slime, with a low dyke or bank looking black and grim beyond. I
felt that if I could but reach that dyke in safety I could there, with
solid ground under my feet and some kind of path to guide me, find with
comparative ease a way out of my troubles. After a glance right and
left and seeing no one near, I kept my eyes for a few minutes to their
rightful work of aiding my feet whilst I crossed the swamp. It was
rough, hard work, but there was little danger, merely toil; and a short
time took me to the dyke. I rushed up the slope exulting; but here
again I met a new shock. On either side of me rose a number of
crouching figures. From right and left they rushed at me. Each body
held a rope.
The cordon was nearly complete. I could pass on neither side, and the
end was near.
There was only one chance, and I took it. I hurled myself across the
dyke, and escaping out of the very clutches of my foes threw myself
into the stream.
At any other time I should have thought that water foul and filthy, but
now it was as welcome as the most crystal stream to the parched
traveller. It was a highway of safety!
My pursuers rushed after me. Had only one of them held the rope it
would have been all up with me, for he could have entangled me before I
had time to swim a stroke; but the many hands holding it embarrassed
and delayed them, and when the rope struck the water I heard the splash
well behind me. A few minutes’ hard swimming took me across the stream.
Refreshed with the immersion and encouraged by the escape, I climbed
the dyke in comparative gaiety of spirits.
From the top I looked back. Through the darkness I saw my assailants
scattering up and down along the dyke. The pursuit was evidently not
ended, and again I had to choose my course. Beyond the dyke where I
stood was a wild, swampy space very similar to that which I had
crossed. I determined to shun such a place, and thought for a moment
whether I would take up or down the dyke. I thought I heard a sound—the
muffled sound of oars, so I listened, and then shouted.
No response; but the sound ceased. My enemies had evidently got a boat
of some kind. As they were on the up side of me I took the down path
and began to run. As I passed to the left of where I had entered the
water I heard several splashes, soft and stealthy, like the sound a rat
makes as he plunges into the stream, but vastly greater; and as I
looked I saw the dark sheen of the water broken by the ripples of
several advancing heads. Some of my enemies were swimming the stream
also.
And now behind me, up the stream, the silence was broken by the quick
rattle and creak of oars; my enemies were in hot pursuit. I put my best
leg foremost and ran on. After a break of a couple of minutes I looked
back, and by a gleam of light through the ragged clouds I saw several
dark forms climbing the bank behind me. The wind had now begun to rise,
and the water beside me was ruffled and beginning to break in tiny
waves on the bank. I had to keep my eyes pretty well on the ground
before me, lest I should stumble, for I knew that to stumble was death.
After a few minutes I looked back behind me. On the dyke were only a
few dark figures, but crossing the waste, swampy ground were many more.
What new danger this portended I did not know—could only guess. Then as
I ran it seemed to me that my track kept ever sloping away to the
right. I looked up ahead and saw that the river was much wider than
before, and that the dyke on which I stood fell quite away, and beyond
it was another stream on whose near bank I saw some of the dark forms
now across the marsh. I was on an island of some kind.
My situation was now indeed terrible, for my enemies had hemmed me in
on every side. Behind came the quickening roll of the oars, as though
my pursuers knew that the end was close. Around me on every side was
desolation; there was not a roof or light, as far as I could see. Far
off to the right rose some dark mass, but what it was I knew not. For a
moment I paused to think what I should do, not for more, for my
pursuers were drawing closer. Then my mind was made up. I slipped down
the bank and took to the water. I struck out straight ahead so as to
gain the current by clearing the backwater of the island, for such I
presume it was, when I had passed into the stream. I waited till a
cloud came driving across the moon and leaving all in darkness. Then I
took off my hat and laid it softly on the water floating with the
stream, and a second after dived to the right and struck out under
water with all my might. I was, I suppose, half a minute under water,
and when I rose came up as softly as I could, and turning, looked back.
There went my light brown hat floating merrily away. Close behind it
came a rickety old boat, driven furiously by a pair of oars. The moon
was still partly obscured by the drifting clouds, but in the partial
light I could see a man in the bows holding aloft ready to strike what
appeared to me to be that same dreadful pole-axe which I had before
escaped. As I looked the boat drew closer, closer, and the man struck
savagely. The hat disappeared. The man fell forward, almost out of the
boat. His comrades dragged him in but without the axe, and then as I
turned with all my energies bent on reaching the further bank, I heard
the fierce whirr of the muttered “Sacre!” which marked the anger of my
baffled pursuers.
That was the first sound I had heard from human lips during all this
dreadful chase, and full as it was of menace and danger to me it was a
welcome sound for it broke that awful silence which shrouded and
appalled me. It was as though an overt sign that my opponents were men
and not ghosts, and that with them I had, at least, the chance of a
man, though but one against many.
But now that the spell of silence was broken the sounds came thick and
fast. From boat to shore and back from shore to boat came quick
question and answer, all in the fiercest whispers. I looked back—a
fatal thing to do—for in the instant someone caught sight of my face,
which showed white on the dark water, and shouted. Hands pointed to me,
and in a moment or two the boat was under weigh, and following hard
after me. I had but a little way to go, but quicker and quicker came
the boat after me. A few more strokes and I would be on the shore, but
I felt the oncoming of the boat, and expected each second to feel the
crash of an oar or other weapon on my head. Had I not seen that
dreadful axe disappear in the water I do not think that I could have
won the shore. I heard the muttered curses of those not rowing and the
laboured breath of the rowers. With one supreme effort for life or
liberty I touched the bank and sprang up it. There was not a single
second to spare, for hard behind me the boat grounded and several dark
forms sprang after me. I gained the top of the dyke, and keeping to the
left ran on again. The boat put off and followed down the stream.
Seeing this I feared danger in this direction, and quickly turning, ran
down the dyke on the other side, and after passing a short stretch of
marshy ground gained a wild, open flat country and sped on.
Still behind me came on my relentless pursuers. Far away, below me, I
saw the same dark mass as before, but now grown closer and greater. My
heart gave a great thrill of delight, for I knew that it must be the
fortress of Bicêtre, and with new courage I ran on. I had heard that
between each and all of the protecting forts of Paris there are
strategic ways, deep sunk roads where soldiers marching should be
sheltered from an enemy. I knew that if I could gain this road I would
be safe, but in the darkness I could not see any sign of it, so, in
blind hope of striking it, I ran on.
Presently I came to the edge of a deep cut, and found that down below
me ran a road guarded on each side by a ditch of water fenced on either
side by a straight, high wall.
Getting fainter and dizzier, I ran on; the ground got more broken—more
and more still, till I staggered and fell, and rose again, and ran on
in the blind anguish of the hunted. Again the thought of Alice nerved
me. I would not be lost and wreck her life: I would fight and struggle
for life to the bitter end. With a great effort I caught the top of the
wall. As, scrambling like a catamount, I drew myself up, I actually
felt a hand touch the sole of my foot. I was now on a sort of causeway,
and before me I saw a dim light. Blind and dizzy, I ran on, staggered,
and fell, rising, covered with dust and blood.
“Halt la!”
The words sounded like a voice from heaven. A blaze of light seemed to
enwrap me, and I shouted with joy.
“Qui va la?” The rattle of musketry, the flash of steel before my eyes.
Instinctively I stopped, though close behind me came a rush of my
pursuers.
Another word or two, and out from a gateway poured, as it seemed to me,
a tide of red and blue, as the guard turned out. All around seemed
blazing with light, and the flash of steel, the clink and rattle of
arms, and the loud, harsh voices of command. As I fell forward, utterly
exhausted, a soldier caught me. I looked back in dreadful expectation,
and saw the mass of dark forms disappearing into the night. Then I must
have fainted. When I recovered my senses I was in the guard room. They
gave me brandy, and after a while I was able to tell them something of
what had passed. Then a commissary of police appeared, apparently out
of the empty air, as is the way of the Parisian police officer. He
listened attentively, and then had a moment’s consultation with the
officer in command. Apparently they were agreed, for they asked me if I
were ready now to come with them.
“Where to?” I asked, rising to go.
“Back to the dust heaps. We shall, perhaps, catch them yet!”
“I shall try!” said I.
He eyed me for a moment keenly, and said suddenly:
“Would you like to wait a while or till tomorrow, young Englishman?”
This touched me to the quick, as, perhaps, he intended, and I jumped to
my feet.
“Come now!” I said; “now! now! An Englishman is always ready for his
duty!”
The commissary was a good fellow, as well as a shrewd one; he slapped
my shoulder kindly. “Brave garçon!” he said. “Forgive me, but I knew
what would do you most good. The guard is ready. Come!”
And so, passing right through the guard room, and through a long
vaulted passage, we were out into the night. A few of the men in front
had powerful lanterns. Through courtyards and down a sloping way we
passed out through a low archway to a sunken road, the same that I had
seen in my flight. The order was given to get at the double, and with a
quick, springing stride, half run, half walk, the soldiers went swiftly
along. I felt my strength renewed again—such is the difference between
hunter and hunted. A very short distance took us to a low-lying pontoon
bridge across the stream, and evidently very little higher up than I
had struck it. Some effort had evidently been made to damage it, for
the ropes had all been cut, and one of the chains had been broken. I
heard the officer say to the commissary:
“We are just in time! A few more minutes, and they would have destroyed
the bridge. Forward, quicker still!” and on we went. Again we reached a
pontoon on the winding stream; as we came up we heard the hollow boom
of the metal drums as the efforts to destroy the bridge was again
renewed. A word of command was given, and several men raised their
rifles.
“Fire!” A volley rang out. There was a muffled cry, and the dark forms
dispersed. But the evil was done, and we saw the far end of the pontoon
swing into the stream. This was a serious delay, and it was nearly an
hour before we had renewed ropes and restored the bridge sufficiently
to allow us to cross.
We renewed the chase. Quicker, quicker we went towards the dust heaps.
After a time we came to a place that I knew. There were the remains of
a fire—a few smouldering wood ashes still cast a red glow, but the bulk
of the ashes were cold. I knew the site of the hut and the hill behind
it up which I had rushed, and in the flickering glow the eyes of the
rats still shone with a sort of phosphorescence. The commissary spoke a
word to the officer, and he cried:
“Halt!”
The soldiers were ordered to spread around and watch, and then we
commenced to examine the ruins. The commissary himself began to lift
away the charred boards and rubbish. These the soldiers took and piled
together. Presently he started back, then bent down and rising beckoned
me.
“See!” he said.
It was a gruesome sight. There lay a skeleton face downwards, a woman
by the lines—an old woman by the coarse fibre of the bone. Between the
ribs rose a long spike-like dagger made from a butcher’s sharpening
knife, its keen point buried in the spine.
“You will observe,” said the commissary to the officer and to me as he
took out his note book, “that the woman must have fallen on her dagger.
The rats are many here—see their eyes glistening among that heap of
bones—and you will also notice”—I shuddered as he placed his hand on
the skeleton—“that but little time was lost by them, for the bones are
scarcely cold!”
There was no other sign of any one near, living or dead; and so
deploying again into line the soldiers passed on. Presently we came to
the hut made of the old wardrobe. We approached. In five of the six
compartments was an old man sleeping—sleeping so soundly that even the
glare of the lanterns did not wake them. Old and grim and grizzled they
looked, with their gaunt, wrinkled, bronzed faces and their white
moustaches.
The officer called out harshly and loudly a word of command, and in an
instant each one of them was on his feet before us and standing at
“attention!”
“What do you here?”
“We sleep,” was the answer.
“Where are the other chiffoniers?” asked the commissary.
“Gone to work.”
“And you?”
“We are on guard!”
“Peste!” laughed the officer grimly, as he looked at the old men one
after the other in the face and added with cool deliberate cruelty:
“Asleep on duty! Is this the manner of the Old Guard? No wonder, then,
a Waterloo!”
By the gleam of the lantern I saw the grim old faces grow deadly pale,
and almost shuddered at the look in the eyes of the old men as the
laugh of the soldiers echoed the grim pleasantry of the officer.