NIGHT AND MORNING
§1
Theresia waited for a moment or two at the turn of the passage, until
her keen ear had told her that Bertrand was no longer on the watch and
had closed the door behind him. Then she retraced her steps--on tiptoe,
lest he should hear.
She found her way to the front door; it was still on the latch. She
opened it and peered out into the night. The little porch was deserted,
but out there on the quay a few passers-by still livened the evening
with chatter or song. Theresia was on the point of stepping out of the
porch, when a familiar voice hailed her softly by name:
"Citoyenne Cabarrus!"
A man, dressed in dark clothes, with high boots and sugar-loaf hat, came
out from the dark angle behind the porch.
"Not here!" Theresia whispered eagerly. "Out on the quay. Wait for me
there, my little Chauvelin. I'll be with you anon. I have so much to
tell you!"
Silently, he did as she desired. She waited for a moment in the porch,
watching the meagre figure in the dark cloak making its way across to
the quay, then walking rapidly in the direction of the Pent. The moon
was dazzlingly brilliant. The harbour and the distant sea glistened like
diamond-studded sheets of silver. From afar there came the sound of the
castle clock striking ten. The groups of passers-by had dwindled down to
an occasional amorous couple strolling homewards, whispering soft
nothings and gazing enraptured at the moon; or half-a-dozen sailors
lolling down the quays arm in arm, on their way back to their ship,
obstructing the road, yelling and singing the refrain of the newest
ribald song; or perhaps a belated pedlar, weary of an unprofitable beat,
wending his way dejectedly home.
One of these poor wretches--a cripple with a wooden leg and bent nearly
double with the heavy load on his back--paused for a moment beside the
porch, held out a grimy hand to Theresia, with a pitiable cry.
"Of your charity, kind sir! Buy a little something from the pore ole
man, to buy a bit of bread!"
He looked utterly woebegone, with lank grey hair blown about by the
breeze and a colourless face covered with sweat, that shone like painted
metal in the moonlight.
"Buy a little something, kind sir!" he went on, in a shrill, throaty
voice. "I've a sick wife at 'ome, and pore little gran'childer!"
Theresia--a little frightened, and not at all charitably inclined at
this hour--turned hastily away and went back into the house, whither the
cripple's vigorous curses followed her.
"May Satan and all his armies----"
She shut the door on him and hastened up the passage. That cadaverous
old reprobate had caused her to shudder as with the presentiment of
coming evil.
§2
With infinite precaution, Theresia peeped into the room where she had
left Bertrand. She saw him lying on the sofa, fast asleep.
On the table in the middle of the room there was an old ink-horn, a pen,
and a few loose sheets of paper. Noiseless as a mouse, Theresia slipped
into the room, sat at the table, and hurriedly wrote a few lines.
Bertrand had not moved. Having written her missive, Theresia folded it
carefully, and still on tiptoe, more stealthily even than before, she
slipped the paper between the young man's loosely clasped fingers. Then,
as soundlessly as she had come, she glided out of the room, ran down the
passage, and was out in the porch once more, breathless but relieved.
Bertrand had not moved; and no one had seen her. Theresia only paused in
the porch long enough to recover her breath, then, without hesitation
and with rapid strides, she crossed over to the water's edge and walked
along in the direction of the Pent.
Whereupon, the figure of the old cripple emerged from out the shadows.
He gazed after the fast retreating figure of Theresia for a moment or
two, then threw down his load, straightened out his back, and stretched
out his arms from the shoulders with a sigh of content After which
amazing proceedings he gave a soft, inward chuckle, unstrapped his
wooden leg, slung it with his discarded load across his broad shoulders,
and turning his back upon harbour and sea, turned up the High Street and
strode rapidly away.
§3
When Bertrand Moncrif woke, the dawn was peeping in through the
uncurtained window. He felt cold and stiff. It took him some time to
realise where he was, to collect his scattered senses. He had been
dreaming . . . here in this room . . . Theresia had been here . . . and
she had laid her head against his breast and allowed him to soothe and
comfort her. Then she said that she would come back . . . and he . . .
like a fool . . . had fallen asleep.
He jumped up, fully awake now; and as he did so a folded scrap of paper
fell out of his hand. He had not known that it was there when first he
woke, and somehow it appeared to be a part of his dream. As it lay there
on the sanded floor at his feet, it looked strangely ghostlike, ominous;
and it was with a trembling hand that, presently, he picked it up.
Every minute now brought fuller daylight into the room; a grey, cold
light, for the window faced the south-west, showing a wide stretch of
the tidal harbour and the open sea beyond. The sun, not fully risen, had
not yet shed warmth over the landscape, and to Bertrand this colourless
dawn, the mysterious stillness which earth assumes just before it wakens
to the sun's kiss, seemed inexpressibly dreary and desolate.
He went to the window and threw open the casement. Down below a kitchen
wench was busy scrubbing the flagged steps of the porch; over in the
inner harbour, one or two fishing vessels were preparing to put out to
sea; and from the tidal harbour, the graceful yacht which yesterday had
brought him--Bertrand--and his friends safely to this land of refuge,
was majestically gliding out, like a beautiful swan with gleaming wings
outspread.
Controlling his apprehension, his nervousness, Bertrand at last
contrived to unfold the mysterious epistle. He read the few lines that
were traced with a delicate, feminine hand, and with a sigh of infinite
longing and of ardent passion, he pressed the paper to his lips.
Theresia had sent him a message. Finding him asleep, she had slipped it
into his hand. The marvel was that he did not wake when she stooped over
him, and perhaps even touched his forehead with her lips.
"A kind soul," so the message ran, "hath taken compassion on me. There
was no room for me at the inn, and she has offered me a bed in her
cottage, somewhere close by. I do not know where it is. I have arranged
with the landlord that you shall be left undisturbed in the small room
where we found one another, and where the four walls will whisper to you
of me. Good night, my beloved! To-morrow you will go to London with the
de Servals. I will follow later. It is better so. In London you will
find me at the house of Mme. de Neufchateau, a friend of my father's who
lives at No. 54 in Soho Square, and who offered me hospitality in the
days when I thought I might visit London for pleasure. She will receive
me now that I am poor and an exile. Come to me there. Until then my
heart will feed on the memory of your kiss."
The letter was signed "Theresia."
Bertrand pressed it time and again to his lips. Never in his wildest
dreams had he hoped for this; never even in those early days of rapture
had he tasted such perfect bliss. The letter he hid against his breast.
He was immeasurably happy, felt as if he were treading on air. The sea,
the landscape, no longer looked grey and dreary. This was England, the
land of the free, the land wherein he had regained his beloved. Ah, the
mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel, while seeking ignoble vengeance against
her, for sins which she never had committed, did in truth render him and
her a priceless service. Theresia, courted, adulated, over in Paris, had
been as far removed from Bertrand Moncrif as the stars; but here, where
she was poor and lonely, a homeless refugee like himself, she turned
instinctively to the faithful lover, who would gladly die to ensure her
happiness.
With that letter in his possession, Bertrand felt that he could not
remain indoors. He was pining for open spaces, the sea, the mountains,
God's pure air--the air which she too was breathing even now. He
snatched up his hat and made his way out of the little building. The
kitchen wench paused in her scrubbing and looked up smiling as he ran
past her, singing and shouting for joy. For Régine--the tender, loving
heart that pined for him and for his love--he had not a thought She was
the past, the dull, drabby past wherein he had dwelt before he knew how
glorious a thing life could be, how golden the future, how rosy that
horizon far away.
By the time he reached the harbour, the sun had risen in all its glory.
Way out against the translucent sky, the graceful silhouette of the
schooner swayed gently in the morning breeze, her outspread sails
gleaming like wings that are tinged with gold. Bertrand watched her for
awhile. He thought of the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel and the hideous
vengeance which he had wrought against his beloved. And the rage which
possessed his soul at the thought obscured for a moment the beauty of
the morning and the glory of the sky. With a gesture characteristic of
his blood and of his race, he raised his fist and shook it in the
direction of the distant ship.